How to stop the format ($) for boost::regex_replace in C++?

Question

I'm using boost::regex_replace(replacement_text, regex, new_text) function to do this...

replacement_text = "{replace_me}"

regex = "(\{([^\}]*[^\s]*)\})"

new_text = "$$$"

For every new_text that doesn't contain "$", this works beautifully, new_text would completely replace the replacement_text. But when using the symbol "$$$", it truncates it to "$$", taking off 1 $.

I read that the dollar sign ($) in the specs are for special formatting:

$n

n-th backreference (i.e., a copy of the n-th matched group specified with parentheses in the regex pattern). n must be an integer value designating a valid backreference, greater than 1, and of two digits at most.

So how can I disable this so that it doesn't do special formatting? Thanks in advance!

I don't know much about boost, but typically, regex languages allow you to escape with a backslash - i.e. `new_text = "\$\$\$"` — happydave, Oct 14 '12 at 23:37
Actually, since it's a C string, I guess the backslashes need to be escaped - so maybe `new_text = "\\$\\$\\$"` — happydave, Oct 14 '12 at 23:39

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 14 '12 at 23:48

As you mentioned in your question, $ is an escape sequence in formatter parameter of regex_replace, so like any other special character in PCRE(Perl compatible regex) you can escape it using \! so use \$\$\$ and since you are using C++ you should use \\$\\$\\$(of course you know that already)

How to stop the format ($) for boost::regex_replace in C++?

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