The regular expression: (?-imsx:\\\\(?:[a-zA-Z0-9]+\\)+[a-zA-Z0-9]+) 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): ---------------------------------------------------------------------- \\ '\' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- \\ '\' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- (?: group, but do not capture (1 or more times (matching the most amount possible)): ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [a-zA-Z0-9]+ any character of: 'a' to 'z', 'A' to 'Z', '0' to '9' (1 or more times (matching the most amount possible)) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- \\ '\' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- )+ end of grouping ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [a-zA-Z0-9]+ any character of: 'a' to 'z', 'A' to 'Z', '0' to '9' (1 or more times (matching the most amount possible)) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ) end of grouping ----------------------------------------------------------------------