Regarding my perl version:

perl 5, version 16, subversion 2 (v5.16.2) built for darwin-thread-multi-2level

I expect that a good number of my users will be running on macs, but probably also a lot on Linux. Actually, the problem was reported from a Linux user (Ubuntu, I think) - though it was a much longer string when he used it. I had just started chopping off values from the '{}' pattern until it started to work when I started debugging the issue.

I tried printing the error as you proposed:

perl -e '$x="cff_updated/1_lib/{A3DWE.1.Solexa-142587.splice.fastq,A3D
+WE.1.Solexa-142588.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142589.splice.fastq,A3
+DWE.1.Solexa-142590.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142594.splice.fastq,A
+3DWE.1.Solexa-142595.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-14A3DWE.1.Solexa-142
+597.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142598.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-14
+2599.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142600.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-1
+42602.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142603.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-
+142605.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142606.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa
+-142607.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142608.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solex
+a-142609.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142610.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Sole
+xa-142611.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142612.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Sol
+exa-142613.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142614.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.So
+lexa-142615.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142616.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.S
+olexa-142617.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142618.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.
+Solexa-142619.splice.fastq,A3DWE.1.Solexa-142621.splice.fastq}.drp.fn
+a.lib";use File::Glob ":bsd_glob";@y=bsd_glob($x,GLOB_LIMIT | GLOB_CS
+H);print(join("\n",@y),"\n");print "Error: $\!\n" if &File::Glob::GLO
+B_ERROR;'
cff_updated/1_lib/
[download]

but like you, I didn't get an error. I even tried: "bsd_glob($x,GLOB_LIMIT | GLOB_CSH | GLOB_ERR)".

My main problem with the built-in glob is that it splits on spaces even if they are escaped, and last I tried, it didn't do anything with glob characters like '?' or '{}' or maybe even character classes. I don't remember what version of perl I was running at the time, but it had to have been at least 5.6.

Ultimately, it seems like using perl code to expand the '{}' patterns is the only way to mitigate this truncation issue. basically, I did it like this. Anyone have any streamlining/more-comprehensive suggestions?

    #Keep updating an array to be the expansion of a file pattern to
    #separate files
    my @expanded = ($nospace_string);

    #If there exists a '{X,Y,...}' pattern in the string
    if($nospace_string =~ /\{[^\{\}]+\}/)
      {
    #While the first element still has a '{X,Y,...}' pattern
    #(assuming everything else has the same pattern structure)
    while($expanded[0] =~ /\{[^\{\}]+\}/)
      {
        #Accumulate replaced file patterns in @g
        my @buffer = ();
        foreach my $str (@expanded)
          {
        #If there's a '{X,Y,...}' pattern, split on ','
        if($str =~ /\{([^\{\}]+)\}/)
          {
            my $substr     = $1;
            my $before     = $`;
            my $after      = $';
            my @expansions = split(/,/,$substr);
            push(@buffer,map {$before . $_ . $after} @expansions);
          }
        #Otherwise, push on the whole string
        else
          {push(@buffer,$str)}
          }

        #Reset @f with the newly expanded file strings so that we
        #can handle additional '{X,Y,...}' patterns
        @expanded = @buffer;
      }
      }

    #Pass the newly expanded file strings through
    return(wantarray ? @expanded : [@expanded]);
[download]

Rob

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