... it also works with \b

... unless the string ends with the target character/pattern: 

c:\@Work\Perl\monks>perl -wMstrict -le
"my @answer;
 'asdfgfhjkljx' =~ /f.*j(?{push @answer, $&})\b/;
 print for @answer;
"
fgfhjklj
fgfhj
fhjklj
fhj

c:\@Work\Perl\monks>perl -wMstrict -le
"my @answer;
 'asdfgfhjklj' =~ /f.*j(?{push @answer, $&})\b/;
 print for @answer;
"
fgfhjklj

[download]
Personally, I feel more comfortable using something that cannot possibly be true to force backtracking, like  (?!) or, from Perl 5.10 on,  (*FAIL) or  (*F) even though they take more keystrokes to type.

Update: Oops... I missed "... this special case (single word without a j at the end) ..." in Eily's post; see Eily's reply below.

Give a man a fish:  <%-{-{-{-<

In reply to Re^4: Return string that starts and ends with specific characters by AnomalousMonk
in thread Return string that starts and ends with specific characters by gilthoniel

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