clone

A regex for another thread: it shares the compiled pattern (parse, programs and one-pass table) with re and has a search cache of its own, so it costs far less than a second compile. Free it with free_regex, like any other regex.

Clone before the threads start, or from the thread that owns re: re must not be freed while clone runs. After that, the regexes can be freed in any order and on any thread; the shared part goes with the last one. Memory for the clone and its cache comes from context.allocator, so free it with the same allocator.

Regex :: #import "Extensions/Regex";

re, _ := Regex.compile("[0-9]+");
copy := Regex.clone(*re);
Regex.free_regex(*re);   // the clone keeps the pattern alive
assert(Regex.is_match(*copy, "room 101"));
Regex.free_regex(*copy);

clone :: (re: *Regex) -> Regex