Regex Desktop Tool for Offline Use (Cross Platform)

Question

There are a plethora of SO questions a decade old describing cross platform desktop Regex tools. It seems the most popular options were:

• Kodos (no commits in the past decade, runs off deprecated Qt3)

• Regexr (desktop version ran on Adobe Air, no longer available)

• RegExBuddy ($40, maybe it's the only option)

• With Perl 5.10 use re 'debug';. debugcolor (no clue what this even means)

Are there any modern simple regular expression tools that are cross platform (especially Linux) and will run offline on my desktop?

Answer 1

Are you looking for a tool to run regular expression searches or to help develop & test the regex?

Cross Platform Regular Expression Tool

I am a big fan of Robert Kern's python grin tool/library.

Installation

Once you have python installed on your system just run: pip install grin3 or for python 2 installations leave out the 3

What it does

• Cross platform
• python re syntax
• Defaults to not searching in version control housekeeping locations such as .git/ etc.
• Defaults to not searching backup files

Offline Developer Assistance

The online Regex101 is an excelent tool for building and testing regexes in python, java and pcre (php). It is also available offline from the Chrome store.

Installation

Go to the store page here and click "Add to Chrome".

Usage

It is quite self explanatory in use:

Features

• Cross platform
• Supports multiple regex flavours
• Shows you your matches against sample text that you provide
• Explains your regex
• Provides a quick reference
• Free but you can make a donation

Answer 2

Have you looked at kiki (https://sources.debian.org/src/kiki/0.5.6-8.1/). It's written in Python and uses wxPython, so likely could be run on numerous platforms. It's in Debian repositories, and possibly other Linux versions.

Answer 3

On my side I always use this Chrome App.

It is very simple and light and it support the few things I need (multiline, highlight and replace). The big plus against the online tool regex101 is that once installed on your chrome browser, you can use it without need of Internet connections.

When using an IDE, you cal also install plugins into:

1. IntelliJ IDEA: RegexpTester plugin
2. Eclipse: QuickRex

There are other plugins for Eclipse you can find in the MarketPlace but I did not tested them.

Answer 4

Regular Expressions 101 (Desktop Edition)

Description

This project is a desktop version of the regex101.com site. It embeds a copy of the site inside the application so that no internet connection is required to work on regular expressions.

Installation

Binary distributions can be found under the assets on the github releases page.

• Windows. The application is supplied as an installer executable, download and run the installer to install the application, this will create a shortcut which can be used to launch the software.

• macOS. The application is supplied as a dmg disk image. Download and open the disk image and drag the Regular Expressions 101 icon into the Applications folder, the application can then be launched by double clicking on the Regular Expressions 101 icon in Applications.

• Linux. The application is supplied as an AppImage. Download the application and then from the terminal run the command: chmod +x <downloaded filename>

Links

• Repository: https://github.com/nedrysoft/regex101
• Regex101: https://regex101.com
• Releases: https://github.com/nedrysoft/regex101/releases
• Installation Section: https://github.com/nedrysoft/regex101#installation

Answer 5

With Perl v5.34.0 - (as OP has mentioned in Question body):

Shell-Command echo piped into perl:

echo "Hello cruel world" | perl -nlE "use re 'debugcolor'; /world/i" -

Output as text:

Compiling REx "world"
Final program:
   1: EXACTFU <world> (4)
   4: END (0)
stclass EXACTFU <world> minlen 5 
Matching REx "world" against "Hello cruel world"
Matching stclass EXACTFU <world> against "Hello cruel world" (17 bytes)
  12 <llo cruel world>|   0| 1:EXACTFU <world>(4)
  17 <llo cruel world>|   0| 4:END(0)
Match successful!
Freeing REx: "world"

Colorized output as it looks on my shell: