1.1 Symbols

The following characters have a special meaning:

and the following character pairs too:

When used in a range specifier, the character pair (. is equivalent to the left square bracket [. Likewise, the character pair .) is equivalent to the right square bracket ]. When used for comment delimiters, the character pair (* is equivalent to the left brace { and the character pair *) is equivalent to the right brace }. These character pairs retain their normal meaning in string expressions.