Re: Substrings of unusual size!

[ww]

It's probably possible to do what you ask with regexen and length (to establish a $len for use as a quantifier). OTOH, I ran out of time to play with that, so here's (clumsy, verbose, but functional) code, inspired -- in part -- by RichardK's reply, above.

#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use 5.016;
use Data::Dumper;

# 1057557a1

my @grec =  ('G3301R7435459:LNI10708',
            'GA4:99TGSFAZ3',
            'GINSFAC2:"A_1"',
            );

my @erec = ('E99POLCOM|3||CAP01|66|3301R7435459|||||',
            'E99INSFAC2|MSRA01_1||||||"LNI10708"|',
            'E99TGSFAZ3|A4|||743|||"A_1"|||',
            );

my ($grec, $erec, @Grec_split, @Erec_split, $Grec_split, $Erec_split);

for $grec(@grec) {
    $grec =~ s/^G//;
    my @Grec = split /:/, $grec;
    push @Grec_split, @Grec;
}

for $erec(@erec) {
    $erec =~ s/^E//;
    my @Erec = split /\|/, $erec;
    push @Erec_split, @Erec;            # Better to eliminate empty fi
+elds before push
}

my $i = 0;
my $j = 0;
if ( $i < ( $#Grec_split +2 ) ) {        # +\d 1 if arrs are equal len
+; 2 if unequal
    no warnings 'uninitialized';         # no warn for arrays w/differ
+ent nums of elements

    while ( $Grec_split[$i] ) {
        if ( $Erec_split[$j] eq '' ) {
            say "\t DEBUG Skipping empty \$Erec_split[$j]:  $Erec_spli
+t[$j]";
            if ( $j < ($#Erec_split +1) ) {
                $j++;
                say "\t DEBUG: \$j at Ln 41 after increment: $j ";
            }
        }

        if ( $Grec_split[$i] eq $Erec_split[$j] ) {
             say "\n --> \$Erec_split[$j]: $Erec_split[$j] MATCHES \$G
+rec_split[$i]: $Grec_split[$i]\n";
             $i++;
        } else {
            # say "\t Could NOT MATCH \$Erec_split[$j] (|$Erec_split[$
+j]|) IN \$Grec_split[$i] ( $Grec_split[$i] )";
            # DEBUG
            if ( $j < ($#Erec_split +1) ) {
                $j++;
            } else {
                $j = 0;
                $i++;
            }
        }
    }
    $i++;
}

=head Execution 1057557a1.pl:
                  DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[2]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 3

 --> $Erec_split[5]: 3301R7435459 MATCHES $Grec_split[0]: 3301R7435459

         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[8]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 9
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[10]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 11
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[12]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 13
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[16]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 17
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[19]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 20
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[22]:
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[2]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 3
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[8]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 9
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[10]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 11
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[12]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 13

 --> $Erec_split[15]: A4 MATCHES $Grec_split[2]: A4

         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[16]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 17
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[19]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 20
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[22]:
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[2]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 3
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[8]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 9
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[10]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 11
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[12]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 13
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[16]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 17
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[19]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 20
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[22]:
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[2]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 3
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[8]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 9
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[10]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 11
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[12]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 13
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[16]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 17
         DEBUG Skipping empty $Erec_split[19]:
         DEBUG: $j at Ln 41 after increment: 20

 --> $Erec_split[21]: "A_1" MATCHES $Grec_split[5]: "A_1"

Obviously, this can be greatly improved; some possibilities can be found in the thread beginning at Parallel processing two arrays with different numbers of elements and in Q&A under QandASection: arrays.