Regex to match only if two sequences are identical

Question

Is it possible to write a Java Regex sequence to match two identical sequences within a string. In other words given the string

near[2015-12-1] far[2015-12-1] 

I want to match all strings where the value inside the first square brackets is equal to the one in the second square bracket and the strings outside the square brackets are near[] far[].

near[2015-12-1] far[2015-12-1] MATCH
near[2015-12-3] far[2015-12-1] NO MATCH
near[2015-12-1] far[2014-12-1] NO MATCH
near[2015-12-3] far[2015-12-3] MATCH
foo[2015-12-1] bar[2015-12-1] NO MATCH

Is this possible?

Answer 1

Use capturing group and you should refer those captured characters by back-reference.

"^near\\[(.*?)\\]\\sfar\\[\\1\\]$" 

DEMO