Matching wordpress shortcodes inside a given string

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I wanted to match shortcodes inside a string and found the following regex from here. It works fine. But i want to learn how it works.

Can anyone plz explain me the components of this regex and how it matches the shortcode.

preg_match_all('%(?<=[shortcode]).*?(?=[/shortcode])%s',$content, $result, PREG_PATTERN_ORDER);
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  1. There are tools to explain regular expressions.

    Yours for example:

    NODE                     EXPLANATION
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  (?<=                     look behind to see if there is:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    [                       '['
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    shortcode                'shortcode'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    ]                       ']'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  )                        end of look-behind
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  .*?                      any character  (0 or more times
                           (matching the least amount possible)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  (?=                      look ahead to see if there is:
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    [                       '['
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    /shortcode               '/shortcode'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
    ]                       ']'
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  )                        end of look-ahead
----------------------------------------------------------------------

    Read more about the assertions on http://www.regular-expressions.info/lookaround.html