Society of the Regular Expression

Writing a regular expression is easy. Reading one you wrote last month is a dark art.

Award it to someone today. Your own email app sends it.

Choose a format Metal challenge coin Coming soon 1.75" antique-bronze coin with a 3D high-relief front, raised rim lettering and a beaded edge. Ships in a clear capsule with a backing card. Plastic challenge coin Coming soon 1.75" soft PVC (rubber) coin with 2-3 levels of relief, painted in antique-bronze tones. Lighter and lower-cost than metal. Ships in a clear capsule with a backing card.Available once the artwork is finished. Die-cut vinyl sticker Coming soon 3" die-cut vinyl sticker of the coin artwork with a UV- and water-resistant laminate. Laptop and water-bottle grade.Available once the artwork is finished.

Physical coins and stickers are coming soon. Until then, you can email this coin for free.

Meaning

Writing a regular expression is easy. Reading one you wrote last month is a dark art.

Design

Front (Obverse)

Top rim: SOCIETY OF THE REGULAR EXPRESSION
Bottom rim: NOW YOU HAVE TWO PROBLEMS
Center: A robed wizard by candlelight studies an ancient scroll covered in symbols like ^(?:[a-z0-9!#$%&'*+/=?^_{|}~-]+)*$`, as if they were glowing runes. A cat sleeps on a stack of books beside them.

Back (Reverse)

An open spellbook titled "IT MATCHED EVERYTHING", flanked by laurels.

Finish & Style

Antique bronze challenge coin, ~1.75" diameter, high-relief center scene, raised rim lettering, beaded outer edge. Matches the existing ITChallengeCoins series.

How to Earn It

Write a regex that went to production and worked on the first try.
Or debug a regex someone else wrote and add comments explaining it.
Or replace a terrifying regex with readable parsing code.

Citation

For mastering the forbidden runes, and for leaving notes for those who come after.