Prefix (computer science)

A prefix of a string $T=t_{1}t_{2}\dots t_{n}$ is a string $P=p_{1}p_{2}\dots p_{m}$ such that $t_{1}\dots t_{m}=p_{1}\dots p_{m}$, where $m\leq n$. A proper prefix of a string is not equal to the string itself and not empty^[1] ($0<m<n$). A prefix can be seen as a special case of a substring.

Example

The string ban is a prefix of the string banana:

T = banana
    |||
P = ban

See also

• Suffix (computer science)

References

• ^ Gusfield, Dan (1999) [1997]. Algorithms on Strings, Trees and Sequences: Computer Science and Computational Biology. USA: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-58519-8.