The regular expression: (?-imsx:\[/.../\]) matches as follows: NODE EXPLANATION ---------------------------------------------------------------------- (?-imsx: group, but do not capture (case-sensitive) (with ^ and $ matching normally) (with . not matching \n) (matching whitespace and # normally): ---------------------------------------------------------------------- \[ '[' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- / '/' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- . any character except \n ---------------------------------------------------------------------- . any character except \n ---------------------------------------------------------------------- . any character except \n ---------------------------------------------------------------------- / '/' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- \] ']' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ) end of grouping ----------------------------------------------------------------------