in reply to Re^4: curious regex result for perl 5.8.8
in thread curious regex result for perl 5.8.8

You misunderstand. Backward compatibility is important. The behavior in the context of prior art is correct and consistent. The behavior in the context of naive expected outcome following a failed match is bogus.

The Apple/Python/PHP/Perl 6/... attitude of "onward and bugger legacy code" is anathema (although I understand where it comes from). This is not that!

Premature optimization is the root of all job security
  • Comment on Re^5: curious regex result for perl 5.8.8

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