Re: Getting matched word from String::Approx

[Athanasius]

There could be more than one word matched, so try this:

#! perl
use strict;
use warnings;
use String::Approx qw(amatch);

my @list   = qw(Apple Pear Orange);
my @inputs = qw(aple appe peay range oranges mango appple aqqple);

for my $word (@inputs)
{
    my  @matches = amatch($word, ['i'], @list);

    if (@matches)
    {
        print "Matched:   $word to: ", join(', ', @matches),  "\n";
    }
    else
    {
        print "Unmatched: $word\n";
    }
}

Output:

22:27 >perl 1501_SoPW.pl
Matched:   aple to: Apple
Matched:   appe to: Apple
Matched:   peay to: Pear
Matched:   range to: Orange
Matched:   oranges to: Orange
Unmatched: mango
Matched:   appple to: Apple
Unmatched: aqqple

22:27 >

Hope that helps,

[Anonymous Monk]

Many thanks Athanasius ))

So amatch tries to match every word in @list even after one has been found? If the list is huge, would it be very slow?

If we just wanted to get the first match from @list and return the result, is there a way to do that?

[Athanasius]

If the list is huge, would it be very slow?

Quite possibly. There’s a discussion in String::Approx#CONTROLLING-THE-CACHE about the tradeoffs between memory and running time.

If we just wanted to get the first match from @list and return the result, is there a way to do that?

From the documentation, this doesn’t seem to be possible, no. :-( When called in scalar context, the amatch function returns a single value, but that value is just true or false to indicate whether or not any matches were found.

Note: Before committing to this module, you should read String::Approx#DESCRIPTION carefully and consider the alternatives. Depending on your requirements, a module such as Text::Levenshtein might suit you better.

Hope that helps,

[Anonymous Monk]

Great thanks for your helpful advice and suggestions.

I intended to use the module for a web-based search function for products. So if a user types a search string that is close to one of the products, then that product name will be suggested to the user. Since more than one match may be returned, I guess I will display the matched products as suggestions.

Would that be considered appropriate in your opinion?