yes, tr/// is not a regex, where s/// is. This means that tr/// should move faster. Let's find out! I'm using 3 sets of randomly generated data, and removing any occurence of the letter 'e' in the string. The results? A winner is tr///! 

use Benchmark;
$reps=500000;

$x.=("a".."z")[rand 26] for (1..256); 
Benchmark::cmpthese($reps, {
'sub256' => '$_=$x;s/e//g;',
'trn256' => '$_=$x;tr/e//d;',
});
print "-"x40,"\n";
$x="";
$x.=("a".."z")[rand 26] for (1..1024); 
Benchmark::cmpthese($reps, {
'sub1024' => '$_=$x;s/e//g;',
'trn1024' => '$_=$x;tr/e//d;',
});
print "-"x40,"\n";
$x="";
$x.=("a".."z")[rand 26] for (1..5120); 
Benchmark::cmpthese($reps, {
'sub5k' => '$_=$x;s/e//g;',
'trn5k' => '$_=$x;tr/e//d;',
});
print "-"x40,"\n";

[download]
Benchmark: timing 500000 iterations of sub256, trn256...
    sub256:  3 wallclock secs ( 3.84 usr +  0.00 sys =  3.84 CPU) @ 130208.33/s (n=500000)
    trn256:  2 wallclock secs ( 1.81 usr +  0.00 sys =  1.81 CPU) @ 276243.09/s (n=500000)
           Rate sub256 trn256
sub256 130208/s     --   -53%
trn256 276243/s   112%     --
----------------------------------------
Benchmark: timing 500000 iterations of sub1024, trn1024...
   sub1024: 15 wallclock secs (14.56 usr +  0.00 sys = 14.56 CPU) @ 34340.66/s (n=500000)
   trn1024:  6 wallclock secs ( 6.81 usr +  0.00 sys =  6.81 CPU) @ 73421.44/s (n=500000)
           Rate sub1024 trn1024
sub1024 34341/s      --    -53%
trn1024 73421/s    114%      --
----------------------------------------
Benchmark: timing 500000 iterations of sub5k, trn5k...
     sub5k: 66 wallclock secs (65.36 usr +  0.00 sys = 65.36 CPU) @ 7649.94/s (n=500000)
     trn5k: 31 wallclock secs (30.64 usr +  0.00 sys = 30.64 CPU) @ 16318.54/s (n=500000)
         Rate sub5k trn5k
sub5k  7650/s    --  -53%
trn5k 16319/s  113%    --
----------------------------------------

In reply to substitution speed vs transliteration speed by boo_radley
in thread Removing commas and dollar signs from a variable. by NodeReaper

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.