You could do a single split on either a '|' or a ':' then process the resulting stream two items (key and value) at a time filtering out the 'special' pairs. You could use the core List::Util->pairs() if on 5.20 or later, or List::MoreUtils->natatime() from CPAN if not, to process in pairs. I use groupsOf() which I wrote when when working in a restricted environment with early Perl versions and no chance of installing non-core modules.

use strict;
use warnings;

use Data::Dumper;

sub groupsOf (&$@);

my $dbStr =
   q{special:1001:area_code:617|special:1001:zip_code:02205|special:10
+01:dow:0|special:1001:tod:14};

my $rhRes = {
   groupsOf { $_[ 0 ] eq q{special} ? () : @_ } 2, split m{\||:}, $dbS
+tr
   };

print Data::Dumper->Dumpxs( [ $rhRes ], [ qw{ rhRes } ] );

sub groupsOf (&$@)
{
    my $rcToRun  = shift;
    my $groupsOf = shift;

    my $rcDoIt;
    $rcDoIt = sub
       {
           $rcToRun->(
              map shift, 1 .. ( @_ < $groupsOf ? @_ : $groupsOf )
              ),
           @_ ? &$rcDoIt : ();
       };
    &$rcDoIt;
}

[download]

The output.

$rhRes = {
           'tod' => '14',
           'zip_code' => '02205',
           'dow' => '0',
           'area_code' => '617'
         };

[download]

I hope this is of interest.

Update: Here's a version using List::Util->pairs(), the output is essentially the same.

use strict;
use warnings;

use List::Util qw{ pairs };
use Data::Dumper;

my $dbStr =
   q{special:1001:area_code:617|special:1001:zip_code:02205|special:10
+01:dow:0|special:1001:tod:14};

my $rhRes = {
   map   { @{ $_ } }
   grep  { $_->[ 0 ] ne q{special} }
   pairs split m{\||:}, $dbStr
   };

print Data::Dumper->Dumpxs( [ $rhRes ], [ qw{ rhRes } ] );

[download]

Cheers,

JohnGG

In reply to Re: Using a regex to replace looping and splitting by johngg
in thread Using a regex to replace looping and splitting by mwb613

Title:
Use:  <p> text here (a paragraph) </p>
and:  <code> code here </code>
to format your post, it's "PerlMonks-approved HTML":


  • 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! —
  • 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:
    & &amp;
    < &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.