gh-133306: Support \z as a synonym for \Z in regular expressions

Doc/howto/regex.rst

@@ -738,8 +738,11 @@ given location, they can obviously be matched an infinite number of times.
    different: ``\A`` still matches only at the beginning of the string, but ``^``
    may match at any location inside the string that follows a newline character.
 
+``\z``
 ``\Z``
    Matches only at the end of the string.
+   ``\z`` is a newer and more portable variant.
+   ``\Z`` is only needed for compatibility with old Python versions.
 
 ``\b``
    Word boundary.  This is a zero-width assertion that matches only at the

Doc/library/re.rst

@@ -266,7 +266,7 @@ The special characters are:
      not a word boundary as outside a set, and numeric escapes
      such as ``\1`` are always octal escapes, not group references.
      Special sequences which do not match a single character such as ``\A``
-     and ``\Z`` are not allowed.
+     and ``\z`` are not allowed.
 
    .. index:: single: ^ (caret); in regular expressions
 
@@ -661,10 +661,14 @@ character ``'$'``.
    matches characters which are neither alphanumeric in the current locale
    nor the underscore.
 
-.. index:: single: \Z; in regular expressions
+.. index:: single: \z; in regular expressions
+           single: \Z; in regular expressions
 
+``\z``
 ``\Z``
    Matches only at the end of the string.
+   ``\z`` is a newer and more portable variant.
+   ``\Z`` is only needed for compatibility with old Python versions.
 
 .. index::
    single: \a; in regular expressions
@@ -711,6 +715,9 @@ three digits in length.
    The :samp:`'\\N\\{{name}\\}'` escape sequence has been added. As in string literals,
    it expands to the named Unicode character (e.g. ``'\N{EM DASH}'``).
 
+.. versionchanged:: next
+   The ``'\z'`` escape sequence has been added.
+
 
 .. _contents-of-module-re:
 

Doc/whatsnew/3.14.rst

@@ -607,6 +607,11 @@ Other language changes
   ASCII :class:`bytes` and :term:`bytes-like objects <bytes-like object>`.
   (Contributed by Daniel Pope in :gh:`129349`.)
 
+* Support ``\z`` as a synonym for ``\Z`` in :mod:`regular expressions <re>`.
+  It is interpreted unambiguously in many other regular expression engines,
+  unlike to ``\Z``, which has subtly different behavior.
+  (Contributed by Serhiy Storchaka in :gh:`133306`.)
+
 * ``\B`` in :mod:`regular expression <re>` now matches empty input string.
   Now it is always the opposite of ``\b``.
   (Contributed by Serhiy Storchaka in :gh:`124130`.)

Lib/re/__init__.py

@@ -61,7 +61,7 @@
 resulting RE will match the second character.
     \number  Matches the contents of the group of the same number.
     \A       Matches only at the start of the string.
-    \Z       Matches only at the end of the string.
+    \z       Matches only at the end of the string.
     \b       Matches the empty string, but only at the start or end of a word.
     \B       Matches the empty string, but not at the start or end of a word.
     \d       Matches any decimal digit; equivalent to the set [0-9] in

Lib/re/_parser.py

@@ -49,7 +49,8 @@
     r"\S": (IN, [(CATEGORY, CATEGORY_NOT_SPACE)]),
     r"\w": (IN, [(CATEGORY, CATEGORY_WORD)]),
     r"\W": (IN, [(CATEGORY, CATEGORY_NOT_WORD)]),
-    r"\Z": (AT, AT_END_STRING), # end of string
+    r"\z": (AT, AT_END_STRING), # end of string
+    r"\Z": (AT, AT_END_STRING), # end of string (deprecated)
 }
 
 FLAGS = {

Lib/test/re_tests.py

@@ -531,7 +531,7 @@
     (r'a[ ]*?\ (\d+).*', 'a   10', SUCCEED, 'found', 'a   10'),
     (r'a[ ]*?\ (\d+).*', 'a    10', SUCCEED, 'found', 'a    10'),
     # bug 127259: \Z shouldn't depend on multiline mode
-    (r'(?ms).*?x\s*\Z(.*)','xx\nx\n', SUCCEED, 'g1', ''),
+    (r'(?ms).*?x\s*\z(.*)','xx\nx\n', SUCCEED, 'g1', ''),
     # bug 128899: uppercase literals under the ignorecase flag
     (r'(?i)M+', 'MMM', SUCCEED, 'found', 'MMM'),
     (r'(?i)m+', 'MMM', SUCCEED, 'found', 'MMM'),

Lib/test/test_re.py

@@ -619,6 +619,7 @@ def test_re_fullmatch(self):
         self.assertEqual(re.fullmatch(r"a.*?b", "axxb").span(), (0, 4))
         self.assertIsNone(re.fullmatch(r"a+", "ab"))
         self.assertIsNone(re.fullmatch(r"abc$", "abc\n"))
+        self.assertIsNone(re.fullmatch(r"abc\z", "abc\n"))
         self.assertIsNone(re.fullmatch(r"abc\Z", "abc\n"))
         self.assertIsNone(re.fullmatch(r"(?m)abc$", "abc\n"))
         self.assertEqual(re.fullmatch(r"ab(?=c)cd", "abcd").span(), (0, 4))
@@ -802,6 +803,8 @@ def test_special_escapes(self):
         self.assertEqual(re.search(r"\B(b.)\B",
                                    "abc bcd bc abxd", re.ASCII).group(1), "bx")
         self.assertEqual(re.search(r"^abc$", "\nabc\n", re.M).group(0), "abc")
+        self.assertEqual(re.search(r"^\Aabc\z$", "abc", re.M).group(0), "abc")
+        self.assertIsNone(re.search(r"^\Aabc\z$", "\nabc\n", re.M))
         self.assertEqual(re.search(r"^\Aabc\Z$", "abc", re.M).group(0), "abc")
         self.assertIsNone(re.search(r"^\Aabc\Z$", "\nabc\n", re.M))
         self.assertEqual(re.search(br"\b(b.)\b",
@@ -813,6 +816,8 @@ def test_special_escapes(self):
         self.assertEqual(re.search(br"\B(b.)\B",
                                    b"abc bcd bc abxd", re.LOCALE).group(1), b"bx")
         self.assertEqual(re.search(br"^abc$", b"\nabc\n", re.M).group(0), b"abc")
+        self.assertEqual(re.search(br"^\Aabc\z$", b"abc", re.M).group(0), b"abc")
+        self.assertIsNone(re.search(br"^\Aabc\z$", b"\nabc\n", re.M))
         self.assertEqual(re.search(br"^\Aabc\Z$", b"abc", re.M).group(0), b"abc")
         self.assertIsNone(re.search(br"^\Aabc\Z$", b"\nabc\n", re.M))
         self.assertEqual(re.search(r"\d\D\w\W\s\S",
@@ -836,7 +841,7 @@ def test_other_escapes(self):
         self.assertEqual(re.match(r"[\^a]+", 'a^').group(), 'a^')
         self.assertIsNone(re.match(r"[\^a]+", 'b'))
         re.purge()  # for warnings
-        for c in 'ceghijklmopqyzCEFGHIJKLMNOPQRTVXY':
+        for c in 'ceghijklmopqyCEFGHIJKLMNOPQRTVXY':
             with self.subTest(c):
                 self.assertRaises(re.PatternError, re.compile, '\\%c' % c)
         for c in 'ceghijklmopqyzABCEFGHIJKLMNOPQRTVXYZ':
@@ -2608,8 +2613,8 @@ def test_findall_atomic_grouping(self):
         self.assertEqual(re.findall(r'(?>(?:ab){1,3})', 'ababc'), ['abab'])
 
     def test_bug_gh91616(self):
-        self.assertTrue(re.fullmatch(r'(?s:(?>.*?\.).*)\Z', "a.txt")) # reproducer
-        self.assertTrue(re.fullmatch(r'(?s:(?=(?P<g0>.*?\.))(?P=g0).*)\Z', "a.txt"))
+        self.assertTrue(re.fullmatch(r'(?s:(?>.*?\.).*)\z', "a.txt")) # reproducer
+        self.assertTrue(re.fullmatch(r'(?s:(?=(?P<g0>.*?\.))(?P=g0).*)\z', "a.txt"))
 
     def test_bug_gh100061(self):
         # gh-100061

Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2025-05-02-21-35-03.gh-issue-133306.-vBye5.rst

@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+Support ``\z`` as a synonym for ``\Z`` in :mod:`regular expressions <re>`.