regular expression to match specific text not linked

Question

I would like to write a regular expression in javascript to match specific text, only when it is not part of an html link, i.e.

match <a href="/link/page1">match text</a>

would not be matched, but

match text

or

<p>match text</p>

would be matched.

(The "match text" will change each time the search is run - I will use something like

var tmpStr = new RegExp("\bmatch text\b","g");

where the value of "match text" is read from a database.)

So far my best effort at a regular expression is

\bmatch text\b(?!</a>)

This deals with the closing , but not the initial . This will probably work fine for my purposes, but it does not seem ideal. I'd appreciate any help with refining the regular expression.

Answer 1

See this previous SO question.

Answer 2

You can use a negative look-behind to get the opening <a href=...:

var tmpStr = new RegExp('(?<!<a.*?>)match text(?!</a>)');

Hope that works for you.

Answer 3

Thanks for the very quick and helpful answers. Just to clarify, the regular expression I ended up using was

(?!<a.*?>)\bmatch text\b(?!</a>)