Scope the job before the pattern
Separate regex-fit text matching from parsing, business rules, and cleanup before writing a pattern.
The move: define the regex job before the regex. Regular expressions are patterns for character combinations. They are not full data-quality programs. When a pattern becomes unreadable, the usual cause is not "regex is hard"; it is that too many jobs were hidden inside one expression. Use MECE scoping before you type the first slash. Ask: What must be matched by character shape? What should be parsed by a real parser? What must be normalized before matching? What business rule belongs after matching? What error should be handed to a person or a data owner? For example, matching an invoice…
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