A pattern matching system
Ian Sommerville · Software Practice and Experience · 1982
Abstract This paper describes a pattern matching system which has been implemented as a set of library procedures. The system provides a concise and consistent method of pattern definition and facilities for defining context sensitive pattern matching, defining repetitive patterns and defining alternatives. The operations available to the user allow him to identify if a substring matches a pattern, to extract that substring, to replace that substring and to associate a name with that substring. The system has applications in information retrieval, text manipulation and language processing.