madbee:

If multiple searches could yield different results and you have an algorithm to determine which one is "better", then instead of stopping the search when you find the first one, call your function to score the result and stow it away. Then, once you do all the searches, you can choose the best one. Something like:

#!/usr/bin/perl
use strict; use warnings; use autodie;
use XML::LibXML;
use Data::Dumper;

for my $FName (qw(1041480.1 1041480.2)) {
    print "----------- SEARCHING DOCUMENT $FName ---------\n";
    my $dom = XML::LibXML->load_xml(location=>$FName);

    my @hits;
    for my $search ('/root/part/sect/header', '/root/para') {
        print "----- searching: $search\n";
        my $nodeset = $dom->find($search);

        my $text = join('', map { $_->string_value } $nodeset->get_nod
+elist);
        if ($text =~ /design/i) {
            # found a match!  score it and store it
            my $score = goodness_evaluator($text);
            push @hits, [ $score, $text ];
        }
    }

    if (@hits) {
        @hits = sort {$a->[0] <=> $b->[0]} @hits;
        my ($score, $text) = @{$hits[0]};
        print "$FName: Best match: score=$score, text=$text\n";
    }
    else {
        print "$FName: no matches found\n";
    }
}

sub goodness_evaluator {
    my $t = shift;
    my $score = 0;
    $score += ord($_) for $t=~m/(.)/g;
    return $score;
}
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...roboticus

When your only tool is a hammer, all problems look like your thumb.