use strict;
use warnings;

my $string = shift;

if ( $string =~ /received 486 response/ ) {
    print "matched $string\n";
}
else {
    print "did not match $string\n";
}
[download]

Ran it with 'script.pl "received 486 response"' and it worked as intended. It does not match "received 485 response" or "received 480 response" or "received 487 response".

EDIT: Maybe you should post some code other that the pattern match, so we can see what is going on.

EDIT2: Here is another example:

my @array = (
    "received 480 response",
    "received 485 response",
    "received 486 response",
    "received 487 response"
);

for (@array) {
    if ( $_ =~ /received 486 response/ ) {
        print "matched $_\n";
    }
    else {
        print "did not match $_\n";
    }
}

________________________________________________

Output is:
F:\>script.pl
did not match received 480 response
did not match received 485 response
matched received 486 response
did not match received 487 response
[download]

So maybe what ever is inside your variable is indeed not what you think it is <.<

---

---

Posts are HTML formatted. Put <p> </p> tags around your paragraphs. Put <code> </code> tags around your code and data!

Titles consisting of a single word are discouraged, and in most cases are disallowed outright.

Read Where should I post X? if you're not absolutely sure you're posting in the right place.

Please read these before you post! —

• How do I compose an effective node title?
• How do I post a question effectively?
• Markup in the Monastery

Posts may use any of the Perl Monks Approved HTML tags:

a, abbr, b, big, blockquote, br, caption, center, col, colgroup, dd, del, details, div, dl, dt, em, font, h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6, hr, i, ins, li, ol, p, pre, readmore, small, span, spoiler, strike, strong, sub, summary, sup, table, tbody, td, tfoot, th, thead, tr, tt, u, ul, wbr

You may need to use entities for some characters, as follows. (Exception: Within code tags, you can put the characters literally.)

	For:		Use:
	&		&
	<		&lt;
	>		&gt;
	[		&#91;
	]		&#93;

Link using PerlMonks shortcuts! What shortcuts can I use for linking?

See Writeup Formatting Tips and other pages linked from there for more info.