$ perl -Mre=debug -e " $f=q{a??q}; $f =~ m{\Qa??\E}; " Compiling REx "a\?\?" Final program: 1: EXACT (3) 3: END (0) anchored "a??" at 0 (checking anchored isall) minlen 3 Guessing start of match in sv for REx "a\?\?" against "a??q" Found anchored substr "a??" at offset 0... Guessed: match at offset 0 Freeing REx: "a\?\?" #### $ perl -le " print qr{\Qa??\E}; " (?^:a\?\?) #### $ perl -le " print qr'\Qa??\E'; " (?^:\Qa??\E) #### $ perl -Mre=debug -e " $f=q{a??q}; $f =~ m'\Qa??\E'; " Compiling REx "\Qa??\E" Final program: 1: EXACT (3) 3: MINMOD (4) 4: CURLY {0,1} (8) 6: EXACT (0) 8: EXACT (10) 10: END (0) anchored "Q" at 0 floating "E" at 1..2 (checking floating) minlen 2 Guessing start of match in sv for REx "\Qa??\E" against "a??q" Did not find floating substr "E"... Match rejected by optimizer Freeing REx: "\Qa??\E"