c:\@Work\Perl\monks>perl -wMstrict -le "use 5.010; ;; for my $s (qw(aaxyxyxy aaaxyxyxy aaaaxyxyxy)) { my $match = $s =~ m{ \b (a+) ((?: xy)+) \b (?(?{ 2 * length($1) != length($2) }) (*FAIL)) }xms; print $match ? ' ' : 'NO ', qq{match '$s'}; } " NO match 'aaxyxyxy' match 'aaaxyxyxy' NO match 'aaaaxyxyxy' #### c:\@Work\Perl\monks>perl -wMstrict -le "use 5.010; ;; for my $s (qw(aaxyxyxy aaaxyxyxy aaaaxyxyxy)) { my $match = $s =~ m{ \b (a+) (?{ length $^N }) ((?: xy)+) \b (?(?{ 2 * $^R != length $^N }) (*FAIL)) }xms; print $match ? ' ' : 'NO ', qq{match '$s'}; } " NO match 'aaxyxyxy' match 'aaaxyxyxy' NO match 'aaaaxyxyxy'