For completeness, here is the answers above with the use of Test::More

use utf8 is needed because of the accented characters in the text in the bottom part

use strict;
use warnings;
use utf8;
use Test::More;
use open OUT => ':encoding(utf8)';
use open ':std';
my $pos=1;
while ( my $t = <DATA> ) {
    chomp $t;
    #printf "orig: %-30s translated: %s\n", $t, translate_yeli2($t);
    my @data = split/\s\*\*\s/, $t;
    my $res = translate_eily2($data[0]);
    # die $data[1];
   ok ($res eq $data[1], "*" . $data[0]. "* -> *" . $res . "* / *". $d
+ata[1]. "* " . $pos++);
}

done_testing;

sub translate {
    my $str = shift;
    $str =~ tr/-/ /;           #replace - with a space
    $str =~ tr/a-zA-Z/ /cs;    #replace non letter with a space
    my @words = split( /\s+/, $str );
    foreach my $w (@words) {

        #insert a space when a upper case is inside a word
        if ( $w =~ /\p{isLower}\p{isUpper}/ ) {
            my @all;
            while ( $w =~ m/\G(\p{isUpper}*\p{isLower}+)/g ) {
                push @all, $1;
            }
            $w = join( " ", @all );
        }
        else {

            $w = ucfirst( lc($w) ); # we are using side effect of fore
+ach loop
        }
    }
    return join( ' ', @words );
}

sub translate_eily {
    my $name = shift;
    $name =~ s/
                [^a-zA-Z]+          # Non letter chars
              |                     #
                (?<= [a-zA-Z] )     # Something that comes after a let
+ter
                (?=  [A-Z] )        # and comes before an uppercase le
+tter
            / /xg;

    # \u is short for ucfirst and \L for lc
    $name =~ s/(\w+)/\u\L$1/g;
     $name =~s/\s+$//g;
    return $name;

}

sub translate_hippo {
    my $str = shift;
    $str =~ tr/a-zA-Z/ /cs;    #replace non letter with a space
    my @words = split( /\s+/, $str );
    foreach my $w (@words) {

        #insert a space when a upper case is inside a word
        $w =~ s/(\p{isLower})(\p{isUpper})/$1 $2/g
            or $w =
            ucfirst( lc($w) );   
    }
    return join( ' ', @words );
}

sub translate_choroba {
    my ($str) = @_;
    $str =~ tr/-/ /;

    #$str =~ tr/a-zA-Z/ /cs;
    $str =~ tr/a-zA-Z/ /cs;       #replace non letter with a space
    $str =~ s/(?<=\p{isLower})(?=\p{isUpper})/ /g;
    $str =~ s/(?:(?<=\s)|(?<=^))(\p{isLower})/\u$1/g;
    $str =~ s/\s+$//r;
}

sub translate_eily2 {
    my $name = shift;
    $name =~ s/
                \P{isLetter}+          # Non letter chars
              |                     # or
                (?<= \p{isLetter} )     # Something that comes after a
+ letter
                (?=  \p{isUpper} )        # and comes before an upperc
+ase letter
            / /xg;
     # print "after s: *$name*\n";
    # \u is short for ucfirst and \L for lc
    $name =~ s/(\w+)/\u\L$1/g;
    $name =~s/\s+$//g;
    return $name;

}

__DATA__
Acierno James S., Jr. ** Acierno James S Jr
Ackermann-Hirschi L. ** Ackermann Hirschi L
Alba-Castro Jose-Luis ** Alba Castro Jose Luis
Boulangère Françoise ** Boulangère Françoise
AlconadaVerzini M. J. ** Alconada Verzini M J
AmorDosSantos S. P ** Amor Dos Santos S P
da Costa F. Barreiro Guimaraes ** Da Costa F Barreiro Guimaraes
deRenstrom P. A. Bruckman ** De Renstrom P A Bruckman
Fauccigiannelli M. ** Fauccigiannelli M
FaucciGiannelli M. ** Faucci Giannelli M
Yao W-M ** Yao W M
Yao W-M. ** Yao W M
Yao W. -M ** Yao W M
Yao W. -M. ** Yao W M
[download]

Hi, you might like Test::More::UTF8.

Hope this helps!



The way forward always starts with a minimal test.