Why is the start of a line "^" and the end of line "$"?

Question

I never remember whether ^ matches the beginning of the line and $ matches the end of it or the other way around. A good mnemonic would be that the $ sign is always before the price, therefore it matches the beginning of a line - unfortunately it's the other way around.

So is there any reason why these two characters were chosen for the beginning and end of line?

Personally, I reckon [they] just chose two characters that hadn't been assigned yet. — Bojangles, Sep 03 '12 at 14:28
Dont know about the reason. But they never confuses me. My thinking is different. Every time I see `^`, `$` I interpret it as start and end. E.G. See the $ of the document. If you ever use `vi` you'll notice `0`, `$` means start and end. — Shiplu Mokaddim, Sep 03 '12 at 14:35
$ represents the newline character(s) in asm language, I think this is related — Eregrith, Sep 03 '12 at 14:35

score 7 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:34

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One mnemonic: In an auction, bidders start by raising ^ their paddles. The price $ is established at the end.

answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:34

Blue Magister

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score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:26

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I memorize ^ as: It points to where it came from, i.e. the previous line, so it should stand at the beginning.

answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:26

Daniel Hilgarth

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score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 03 '12 at 20:50

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The $ used to mean the end of the line in very early editors, like ed. The ^ was probably chosen because it was about the last unused character on keyboards at the time :-)

answered Sep 03 '12 at 20:50

user711413

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Clement J. · Answer 4 · 2012-09-03T14:39:34.907

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This is probably due to the relative positions of these two characters on a QWERTY keyboard: '^' in first position (start of line) and '$' after (end of line).

EDIT: My bad, this is only valid on a french keyboard (AZERTY). It provides a mnemonic for AZERTY user but not an explanation.

edited Sep 03 '12 at 14:39

answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:28

Clement J.

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And it would be backwards because? – lc. Sep 03 '12 at 14:30
Seems you need to remember the word *backword* with this rule too. – Shiplu Mokaddim Sep 03 '12 at 14:37
@lc.: What is your comment supposed to ask? It is not backwards. – Daniel Hilgarth Sep 03 '12 at 14:38
@DanielHilgarth The fact that $ (4) comes before ^ (6), at least on a US layout. – lc. Sep 03 '12 at 16:15
@lc. ah, ok. On my german layout ^ is to the left of 1 and $ is on 4 :-) – Daniel Hilgarth Sep 03 '12 at 16:18

weston · Answer 5 · 2012-09-03T14:47:41.660

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\A and \Z do roughly the same, except they are subtly different to ^/$ with respect to new line characters.

So if you remember that and also remember that ^ looks most similar to A and $ is most simliar to Z that might be enough of a mnemonic.

edited Sep 03 '12 at 14:47

answered Sep 03 '12 at 14:38

weston

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Why is the start of a line "^" and the end of line "$"?

5 Answers5