453554 - Regular Expressions (RegExp) can't contain unicode character sets/categories like [:Letter:]

Status: RESOLVED DUPLICATE of bug 258974

(Core :: JavaScript Engine, enhancement)

Description

[Hans Schmucker]

User-Agent:       Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1b1pre) Gecko/20080901033305 Minefield/3.1b1pre
Build Identifier: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.9.1b1pre) Gecko/20080901033305 Minefield/3.1b1pre

Currently, it seems that it's very difficult to actually match any special sets of characters in JS. Sure, you can use ranges like A-Z, but if you try to define a set like "all letters" things get a whole lot more complicated. Recent RegExp implementations (like Perl) have means of identifying Unicode character sets (like :Lu: for all uppercase letters), but it seems like those aren't available yet. Having character sets available would be very useful to non-English developers/users.

Reproducible: Always

Steps to Reproduce:
1.Copy javascript:alert(/[:Letter:]/.exec("X")); to your url bar and press enter
2.Copy javascript:alert(/[A-Z]/.exec("X")); to your url bar and press enter
Actual Results:  
You get different results (null vs. "X")

Expected Results:  
You should get the same result as A-Z is a subset of :Letter:

I know that these sets are not specified in Ecma-262. Question is, would it harm anybody to include them?

Comment 1

[Hans Schmucker]

Almost forgot, the Perl notation for these is \p{Letter}

Comment 2

[Hans Schmucker]

Oh and here's a RegExp that does "match letters", so you can see how much easier it would be :)

/[\u0041-\u005A\u0061-\u007A\u00AA\u00B5\u00BA\u00C0-\u00D6\u00D8-\u00F6\u00F8-\u02C1\u02C6-\u02D1\u02E0-\u02E4\u02EC\u02EE\u0370-\u0374\u0376-\u0377\u037A-\u037D\u0386\u0388-\u038A\u038C\u038E-\u03A1\u03A3-\u03F5\u03F7-\u0481\u048A-\u0523\u0531-\u0556\u0559\u0561-\u0587\u05D0-\u05EA\u05F0-\u05F2\u0621-\u064A\u066E-\u066F\u0671-\u06D3\u06D5\u06E5-\u06E6\u06EE-\u06EF\u06FA-\u06FC\u06FF\u0710\u0712-\u072F\u074D-\u07A5\u07B1\u07CA-\u07EA\u07F4-\u07F5\u07FA\u0904-\u0939\u093D\u0950\u0958-\u0961\u0971-\u0972\u097B-\u097F\u0985-\u098C\u098F-\u0990\u0993-\u09A8\u09AA-\u09B0\u09B2\u09B6-\u09B9\u09BD\u09CE\u09DC-\u09DD\u09DF-\u09E1\u09F0-\u09F1\u0A05-\u0A0A\u0A0F-\u0A10\u0A13-\u0A28\u0A2A-\u0A30\u0A32-\u0A33\u0A35-\u0A36\u0A38-\u0A39\u0A59-\u0A5C\u0A5E\u0A72-\u0A74\u0A85-\u0A8D\u0A8F-\u0A91\u0A93-\u0AA8\u0AAA-\u0AB0\u0AB2-\u0AB3\u0AB5-\u0AB9\u0ABD\u0AD0\u0AE0-\u0AE1\u0B05-\u0B0C\u0B0F-\u0B10\u0B13-\u0B28\u0B2A-\u0B30\u0B32-\u0B33\u0B35-\u0B39\u0B3D\u0B5C-\u0B5D\u0B5F-\u0B61\u0B71\u0B83\u0B85-\u0B8A\u0B8E-\u0B90\u0B92-\u0B95\u0B99-\u0B9A\u0B9C\u0B9E-\u0B9F\u0BA3-\u0BA4\u0BA8-\u0BAA\u0BAE-\u0BB9\u0BD0\u0C05-\u0C0C\u0C0E-\u0C10\u0C12-\u0C28\u0C2A-\u0C33\u0C35-\u0C39\u0C3D\u0C58-\u0C59\u0C60-\u0C61\u0C85-\u0C8C\u0C8E-\u0C90\u0C92-\u0CA8\u0CAA-\u0CB3\u0CB5-\u0CB9\u0CBD\u0CDE\u0CE0-\u0CE1\u0D05-\u0D0C\u0D0E-\u0D10\u0D12-\u0D28\u0D2A-\u0D39\u0D3D\u0D60-\u0D61\u0D7A-\u0D7F\u0D85-\u0D96\u0D9A-\u0DB1\u0DB3-\u0DBB\u0DBD\u0DC0-\u0DC6\u0E01-\u0E30\u0E32-\u0E33\u0E40-\u0E46\u0E81-\u0E82\u0E84\u0E87-\u0E88\u0E8A\u0E8D\u0E94-\u0E97\u0E99-\u0E9F\u0EA1-\u0EA3\u0EA5\u0EA7\u0EAA-\u0EAB\u0EAD-\u0EB0\u0EB2-\u0EB3\u0EBD\u0EC0-\u0EC4\u0EC6\u0EDC-\u0EDD\u0F00\u0F40-\u0F47\u0F49-\u0F6C\u0F88-\u0F8B\u1000-\u102A\u103F\u1050-\u1055\u105A-\u105D\u1061\u1065-\u1066\u106E-\u1070\u1075-\u1081\u108E\u10A0-\u10C5\u10D0-\u10FA\u10FC\u1100-\u1159\u115F-\u11A2\u11A8-\u11F9\u1200-\u1248\u124A-\u124D\u1250-\u1256\u1258\u125A-\u125D\u1260-\u1288\u128A-\u128D\u1290-\u12B0\u12B2-\u12B5\u12B8-\u12BE\u12C0\u12C2-\u12C5\u12C8-\u12D6\u12D8-\u1310\u1312-\u1315\u1318-\u135A\u1380-\u138F\u13A0-\u13F4\u1401-\u166C\u166F-\u1676\u1681-\u169A\u16A0-\u16EA\u16EE-\u16F0\u1700-\u170C\u170E-\u1711\u1720-\u1731\u1740-\u1751\u1760-\u176C\u176E-\u1770\u1780-\u17B3\u17D7\u17DC\u1820-\u1877\u1880-\u18A8\u18AA\u1900-\u191C\u1950-\u196D\u1970-\u1974\u1980-\u19A9\u19C1-\u19C7\u1A00-\u1A16\u1B05-\u1B33\u1B45-\u1B4B\u1B83-\u1BA0\u1BAE-\u1BAF\u1C00-\u1C23\u1C4D-\u1C4F\u1C5A-\u1C7D\u1D00-\u1DBF\u1E00-\u1F15\u1F18-\u1F1D\u1F20-\u1F45\u1F48-\u1F4D\u1F50-\u1F57\u1F59\u1F5B\u1F5D\u1F5F-\u1F7D\u1F80-\u1FB4\u1FB6-\u1FBC\u1FBE\u1FC2-\u1FC4\u1FC6-\u1FCC\u1FD0-\u1FD3\u1FD6-\u1FDB\u1FE0-\u1FEC\u1FF2-\u1FF4\u1FF6-\u1FFC\u2071\u207F\u2090-\u2094\u2102\u2107\u210A-\u2113\u2115\u2119-\u211D\u2124\u2126\u2128\u212A-\u212D\u212F-\u2139\u213C-\u213F\u2145-\u2149\u214E\u2160-\u2188\u2C00-\u2C2E\u2C30-\u2C5E\u2C60-\u2C6F\u2C71-\u2C7D\u2C80-\u2CE4\u2D00-\u2D25\u2D30-\u2D65\u2D6F\u2D80-\u2D96\u2DA0-\u2DA6\u2DA8-\u2DAE\u2DB0-\u2DB6\u2DB8-\u2DBE\u2DC0-\u2DC6\u2DC8-\u2DCE\u2DD0-\u2DD6\u2DD8-\u2DDE\u2E2F\u3005-\u3007\u3021-\u3029\u3031-\u3035\u3038-\u303C\u3041-\u3096\u309D-\u309F\u30A1-\u30FA\u30FC-\u30FF\u3105-\u312D\u3131-\u318E\u31A0-\u31B7\u31F0-\u31FF\u3400\u4DB5\u4E00\u9FC3\uA000-\uA48C\uA500-\uA60C\uA610-\uA61F\uA62A-\uA62B\uA640-\uA65F\uA662-\uA66E\uA67F-\uA697\uA717-\uA71F\uA722-\uA788\uA78B-\uA78C\uA7FB-\uA801\uA803-\uA805\uA807-\uA80A\uA80C-\uA822\uA840-\uA873\uA882-\uA8B3\uA90A-\uA925\uA930-\uA946\uAA00-\uAA28\uAA40-\uAA42\uAA44-\uAA4B\uAC00\uD7A3\uF900-\uFA2D\uFA30-\uFA6A\uFA70-\uFAD9\uFB00-\uFB06\uFB13-\uFB17\uFB1D\uFB1F-\uFB28\uFB2A-\uFB36\uFB38-\uFB3C\uFB3E\uFB40-\uFB41\uFB43-\uFB44\uFB46-\uFBB1\uFBD3-\uFD3D\uFD50-\uFD8F\uFD92-\uFDC7\uFDF0-\uFDFB\uFE70-\uFE74\uFE76-\uFEFC\uFF21-\uFF3A\uFF41-\uFF5A\uFF66-\uFFBE\uFFC2-\uFFC7\uFFCA-\uFFCF\uFFD2-\uFFD7\uFFDA-\uFFDC]/

Comment 3

[Brian Crowder]

This is a spec issue, not an engine issue.

Comment 4

[Brian Crowder]

You _can_, by the way, use \w just as you would in perl, however.

Comment 5

[Hans Schmucker]

I agree it's a spec issue, but I thought it could be discusses here, because basically current incremental specs are all mozilla specific.

Oh, and \w only matches latin letters. Try
ä
ǽ
ﺿ
ﻷ
fi

and so on and you'll see that it doesn't match

Comment 6

[Hans Schmucker]

Posted at es-discuss:
https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es-discuss/2008-September/007353.html

Comment 7

[Myk Melez [:myk] [@mykmelez]]

Isn't this essentially a duplicate of bug 258974?

Comment 8

[Hans Schmucker]

Yes it is. Don't ask me how I could have overlooked that one.