Pattern and Regular Expression problem

Question

Hi all!
I have trouble with constructing a pattern.
Consider the following:
import java.util.regex.*;
public class Parser {
public Parser() {
String pattern = "<i18n:message(.*)/>";
String myline = "<INPUT type=\"button\" name=\"cancel\" value='<i18n:message key=\"EXP.EP.EPDATES.CANCEL\"/>' class=\"normal08\" onClick=\"javascript:disableInput();document.panel_menu.submit();\"/>";
Pattern p = Pattern.compile(pattern);
Matcher m = p.matcher(myline);
while ( (m.find()) ) {
System.out.println(m.group());
public static void main(String[] args) {
new Parser();
How should I construct the pattern in order to extract from the string myline just the following sequence: <i18n:message key=\"EXP.EP.EPDATES.CANCEL\"/>
It seems that using the pattern I wrote, it continues the match until the last appearance of "/>", and I need to have the match done until the first appearance of "/>".
Thanks a lot.

Answer 1

No, modify it to (.*?).Hey, unky. Would you mind schooling me a bit here?
"<i18n:message(.*?)/>" right?
against "<i18n:message key=\"EXP.EP.EPDATES.CANCEL\"/>' class=\"normal08\" onClick=\"javascript:disableInput();document.panel_menu.submit();\"/>"
I think I understand, but would appreciate confirmation or correction.
.* is zero or more of anything. The ? makes it reluctant (also called lazy?).
So .* is compared against nothing, succeeds, and the regex moves on to the next character.
This doesn't match / so regex backtracks and tries to match .* against the space, which succeeds, but then / doesn't match against the k in key
So we backtrack, and reluctantly add the k to what .* matches.
We keep adding a character to .*'s match every time the next character isn't a /.
Eventually, .* matches everything up to and including the quote before the first />.
At this point, the / and > literals match, and we're done.
Yes?
And we needed to make it reluctant, else the .* would have started by matching as much of the string as it could, gobbling up all of it, and then backtracking to give the /> literals their match at the end of the string.
Yes?
Thanks!