I'm gonna think on the several parts of "question 1", but "the other question" is easy... The regex /.*c/ will match the longest prefix that ends in c. So if fed "acrobatic cockatoos can fly", it would match "acrobatic cockatoos c". The regex /[^c]*c/ would match the first prefix that ends in c, or "ac". As far as /.*?c/ goes... I think that is roughly equivilant to /[^c]*c/, but I'm not positive.