Problem with regex

collywobble has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

What is wrong with the code below? I'm trying to match the following:

ep_svr_<any number/s>_<3 letters>_<3 letters>_<any characters> 

#!/usr/bin/perl
if ($ARGV[0] =~ m/^ep_svr_\d+_[A-Za-z]{3}_[A-Za-z]{3}_\.+\z/x) {
    print "valid label: $ARGV[0]\n";
    }
else {
    print "invalid label: $ARGV[0]\n";
    };
[download]

Comment on Problem with regex Download Code

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Re: Problem with regex by robartes (Priest) on Feb 05, 2003 at 07:42 UTC
You escaped the 'any character' period, so it becomes a literal period. Try this instead: `#!/usr/bin/perl if ($ARGV[0] =~ m/^ep_svr_\d+_[A-Za-z]{3}_[A-Za-z]{3}_.+\z/x) { print "valid label: $ARGV[0]\n"; } else { print "invalid label: $ARGV[0]\n"; }; __END__ $ epsrv.pl ep_svr_12_abc_abc_theend valid label: ep_svr_12_abc_abc_theend` [download] So, at least for my limited test case, it works. CU Robartes-	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Patterns by insensate (Hermit) on Feb 05, 2003 at 07:00 UTC
From the start I can see that you've included _ in your character classes when I think you want it to precede the class... `/^ep_svr_\d+_\w{3}_\w{3}_.+$/;` [download] Update: The code tags weren't in when i diagnosed the problem...but the code should still fit the bill ;^)	[reply] [d/l]