I wrote something like: 
my ($result)= m[pattern(group)] || "default";

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and it didn't work. $result was 1, not the contents of $1. I wrote it using ?: instead, and I can think of a few other ways to write it, so I'm not looking for immediate help on this problem.

What I am wonering is exactly what the issue is, and how to get around it, for my own knowledge. I'm supposing that || forces scalar context on its arguments, and using ()'s around things doesn't help. So how would you get the RE evaluated in list context?

—John

In reply to Did I match or didn't I? by John M. Dlugosz

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