Re: Meaning of /o in Regexes

[cjf-II]

The /o modifier is used when you only want the pattern compiled once. So in the second pattern, $x will not be incremented and as such, only matches once.

Update: Okay, I promise to read the questions in full before replying from now on (and this time I mean it! ;-). So to answer your actual question...

The difference between qr// and the /o modifier as I understand it is that with /o you can never change the pattern, whereas with qr// you can compile the pattern to be used as part of a larger regex. As the good book shows:

@regexes = ();
for $pattern (@patterns) {
    push @regexes, qr/$pattern/;
}
for $item (@data) {
    for $re (@regexes) {
        if ($item =~ /$re/) { print "Matches!\n"; }
    }
}

I Hope that's slightly more helpful :).

[mce]

Thanks, But this part I understood, it is the comparison with qr that I am puzzeled about.
---------------------------
Dr. Mark Ceulemans
Senior Consultant
IT Masters, Belgium

[slife]

Thanks, But this part I understood, it is the comparison with qr that I am puzzeled about.

/o and qr// provide different services to the programmer:

/o says 'Take this pattern and create a compiled regex that will not change for the life of the program'

qr// says 'Take this pattern and return a special object that I can assign to a variable, interpolate into another pattern, pass to a subroutine, etc, etc, and as a side-effect creates a compiled form that I can use in pattern matches directly.'