Re: *which* alternative that matches nothing? (was Re: repetition)

> > - An alternative that matches no sequences at all, which no thing
> > matches. This is an expression which denotes the language with
> > no sentences, i.e. the empty set. And this is the meaning most
> > naturally associated with the symbol “∅”.
>
> Any reason why [] should not be given this definition?

It does have that definition, but that is a different definition to what you require.

() matches the empty string, so always succeeds.
[] matches *nothing at all*, so always fails.

Steven

Received on Friday, 17 December 2021 20:19:44 UTC