hmmm; what about this. it's simple:
my @records = (<DATA>);
# lookbehind to make sure those that start
# with an apostrophe end with one...
$tok1 = qr/[\'][A-Za-z0-9\s\']+(?<=\')/;
$tok2 = qr/[A-Z\?0-9]+;
# for each record in the above sample...
# note precedence in regex below...
foreach my $record (@records){
my @fields = ($record =~ /$tok1|$tok2/g);
# do something with fields
}
__DATA__
#...those irritating records in full...
works for the dataset provided, and i think for
seavers extension.
...wufnik
-- in the world of the mules there are no rules --