UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi, I would like to set up a Posix string to match the subject line in spam e-mails which contain
"[" followed by a number, followed by "]"

How do I get the square brackets recognised as literals and then include them in a string so that I can reject spam with things like [14] in the subject line.

Excuse my sarcasm, I'm wrestling with a ksh script and the mmmmmmmms struck my me funny.
Have you tried something like "\[[0-9][0-9][0-9]\]"

Not sure what a posix string means. But for a regular expression for grep or something is easy...

grep "\[[0-9]*\]"

All excused - good luck with script

I will try both suggestions - am new to regular expressions

There is one case where this will not work the way you wish, but I leave that to you to discover when you examine the syntax of what Perderabo posted.

Do you mean it will match [] as well as all the patterns with numbers in square brackets. If so I don't think this will be a problem - you would need to be pretty odd to include [] in the subject box of a non-spam e-mail. If this isn't the case you mean, please take pity and tell me - as i said I am new to posix and can do with all the help I can get. Thanks