#!/usr/local/bin/perl -w
use strict;
my $pattern = quotemeta( "|" ) . '?[ *|\.*]' . quotemeta( "|" ); 

while(<DATA>) {
        print;
        chomp;
        s/\cM//g;
        s/$pattern/\|\|/g;
        print "$_\n"; 
}
__DATA__
6|11-XXX-03|999999999|.| |0000|.|.|.|.|.|.| | |.| | | | |.|.| |.|0|N

[download]
The output I get is this ...

6|11-XXX-03|999999999|.| |0000|.|.|.|.|.|.| | |.| | | | |.|.| |.|0|N
6|11-XXX-03|999999999||||0000||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||0|N

... the output I want is this ...

6|11-XXX-03|999999999|.| |0000|.|.|.|.|.|.| | |.| | | | |.|.| |.|0|N
6|11-XXX-03|999999999|||0000||||||||||||||||||0|N

I keep getting extra |'s and I don't know why? What am I doing wrong?

Plankton: 1% Evil, 99% Hot Gas.

In reply to regex help! by Plankton

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