Regex Hero Blog

Those who used the old Silverlight version of Regex Hero will remember that it once had a benchmarking feature and the ability to save your regular expressions to your local computer. Well, both of those features are coming back and will be available in a Standard version that will be sold in the Microsoft Store. Here's a preview of what the two features will look like: Stay tuned for updates. The new Regex Hero Standard version will be available for purchase very soon. A couple months after that you can expect to see Regex Hero Professional become available with even more advanced features.

I just released a free version of Regex Hero to the Microsoft Store. This version replaces the old Silverlight version. You can check it now. If you find any bugs be sure to let me know . This free version includes the following features: Real-time highlighting of regex matches. Match, Replace, and Split modes. Code completion for regular expressions. .NET code generation. Complete .NET regex reference. (New) Automatically terminates long-running regular expressions and allows you to run them manually with a button press.  Requirements: Windows 10 (version 1809 or later) Windows 11 (any version) Right now you can only download it by visiting the link but soon it'll be searchable within the Microsoft Store. And the current plan is to later release a Standard and Professional version with some of the more advanced features just as Regex Hero used to have. Eventually, if .NET MAUI is as good as initial reports would suggest I may be able to create a version that runs on the Mac as we...

Awhile back I began working on an HTML5 / JavaScript version of Regex Hero . However, it was a huge undertaking essentially requiring a complete rewrite of the entire application. I have not had enough time to dedicate to this lately. So I've begun again, this time rewriting Regex Hero to work in WPF. It'll be usable in Windows 10 and downloadable from the Microsoft Store. This is a much easier task that also has the advantage of running the .NET regex library from the application itself. This will allow for the same speedy experience of testing your regular expressions and getting instant feedback that Regex Hero users have always enjoyed. I expect the first release to be ready in Q4 of 2019.

Regex Hero is now completely free!  I've been working on this tool off and on for the past 8 years. I spent a lot of time making it very powerful and easy for developers to create efficient regular expressions. Throughout most of this time it's been a paid product. However, with the added pressure of other free tools out there getting better all the time, I've finally decided to make Regex Hero free as well. Enjoy! Try Regex Hero at http://regexhero.net/tester/

As Firefox just dropped support for Silverlight I really needed a solution for Regex Hero. So I created an installer for it. It's still Silverlight, but by using the installer you can install it directly to your computer and never need to open it in a browser. If you visit regexhero.net/tester and don't have a browser that supports Silverlight (IE is the only one left), then you'll see download links for 64-bit and 32-bit versions of the installer. When you install it you'll see a link over on the right hand side that says "Activate Regex Hero". This process connects your desktop version of Regex Hero with your online account. So if you're a licensed user this is how you'll gain access to all of those licensed features. Note: Currently there will be a security warning when you try to run either one of these installers. I'm in the process of obtaining a code signing certificate and will update them as soon as possible. You may be wondering a...

In the next few months I'll be working on a JavaScript version of Regex Hero. The need to do this comes from the fact that Chrome has dropped support for Silverlight. It's also not supported by the new Microsoft Edge web browser. So the pressure is mounting. Forgive me for not doing something about this sooner. I've had a very busy and exciting year. Recently I moved to a new city and just a few weeks ago I got married. Nonetheless, my plans are to make Regex Hero better than ever and usable on more browsers and devices than ever. Fortunately, there now exists Javascript libraries that'll emulate the .NET framework (even the .NET Regex Class library). The Regex Class library is the main thing I really need to build Regex Hero in JavaScript. JavaScript wasn't an option 6 years ago when I first built Regex Hero in Silverlight. But now that it is, I'm excited about it. I will post updates on this blog as the new development progresses.