Re: regex Quantifiers {m,n}, m can be negative, n greater than 255

Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>

From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
To: jian he <jian.universality@gmail.com>
Cc: PostgreSQL-development <pgsql-hackers@postgresql.org>
Date: 2025-12-11T15:46:54Z
Lists: pgsql-hackers
jian he <jian.universality@gmail.com> writes:
> select regexp_matches(E'abc', 'a{0,257}.');
> select regexp_matches(E'abc', 'a{-0,257}.');
> select regexp_matches(E'abc', 'a{-1,2}.');

> based on the manual description, the second and the third query should
> error out?

No.  Read

https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/functions-matching.html#POSIX-ATOMS-TABLE

which says that '{'

	when followed by a character other than a digit, matches the
	left-brace character {; when followed by a digit, it is the
	beginning of a bound (see below)

So your second and third patterns are just literal matches, except
for the final '.'.

You can quibble about how bright that choice was, but I think it's
mandated by POSIX, not just something that Henry Spencer thought up.

			regards, tom lane