A Definite Clause Grammar to match strings to string patterns, with * as a wildcard.
A pattern is a list of printable characters. The asterisk character is a wildcard which matches one or more characters (not zero like with a glob or regex).
?- % only an empty list matches an empty list
phrase(patt(C),"").
C = []
; false.
?- % wildcard matches one or more characters
phrase(patt(C),"fo").
C = "fo"
; C = "f*"
; C = "*"
; C = "*o"
; false.
?- % test a pattern against a string
phrase(patt("foo*"),"foo/bar").
true
; false.
?- % generate patterns to match two strings
phrase(patt(C),"/bin/bash"), phrase(patt(C), "/bin/sh").
C = "/bin/*"
; C = "/bin/*h"
; C = "/bin*"
; C = "/bin*h"
; C = "/bin*sh"
; ...
; false.
Tested with Trealla and SWI-Prolog. Doesn't work on Scryer Prolog.
With SWI-Prolog, set the double_quotes flag to chars to make the examples work.
?- set_prolog_flag(double_quotes, chars).
Copyright (c) 2023 David Farrell
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