Re^2: alternation in regexes: to use or to avoid?

Not really, because it says:

A complicated pattern tends to defeat this.

and i'm seeing exactly the opposite. I wish Tom would comment on that :) But thank you for the quote, it helps with understanding why I think that the observed behavior is bad.

Comment on Re^2: alternation in regexes: to use or to avoid?

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Re^3: alternation in regexes: to use or to avoid? by Anonymous Monk on Dec 10, 2012 at 15:22 UTC
Perhaps read "complicated" as "non-trivial", EG: having alternations	[reply]
Re^4: alternation in regexes: to use or to avoid? by balker (Novice) on Dec 10, 2012 at 15:29 UTC
Please read the benchmark numbers. Alternation is MUCH faster than looping over trivial regexes, except when you use captures inside the alternations.	[reply]