pattern matching
Finding similar structures
Pattern matching is comparing data against a template to find matches or extract components.
In programming, it tests whether a value fits a particular structure: The function uses pattern matching to handle different input types.
In cognitive contexts, it describes recognizing familiar forms—faces, melodies, chess positions.
The term spans computer science, linguistics, and psychology, but always involves checking whether something fits an expected shape.
- regular expressionNotation for matching text patterns
- regexText-matching notation
- grepText pattern search utility
- find and replaceLocate text, substitute new
- lexical analysisCharacter-to-token conversion process
algorithm · capture · quantifiers · alternation · anchors · unification · wildcards · lookahead · text processing · data extraction · semantic analysis · search · identify · tokenization · similarity · detect · scan · template
- game skillswin condition, tactical awareness, threat detection
- mental shortcutsmental shortcut, rule of thumb, hunch, gut feeling, educated guess
- NLPtokenization, natural language processing, NLP, parsing, stemming
- shell scriptingbash, shebang, scripts, source, sourcing
- text analysistext analysis, bigram, trigram, tokenization, writing style
- visual analysiscolor coding, shape sorting, visual hierarchy, edge detection
pattern matchingtrial and error
Learning through repeated attempts
brute force · random selection · guesswork · stab in the dark · random search
pattern matchingrandom selection
Choosing without systematic bias
chance · coin flip · shot in the dark · pure luck · guesswork
match, pattern, matching, patterned, patterns, patterning, matchmaker, matchmaking, patternless