can you give some examples of the before and after's of your data? You say "global substitute" but aren't clear on what you're transforming the data into ...

if you are just matching, it looks like all you need is a capture in your regex: 
  if (substr($acct_trtmt_hsty,1,1) =~ m/([789])/) {
    print "the number is: " . $1;
  }

[download]
Are you sure the LHS should be the substr and not $acct_trtmt_hsty ? You may also want a strict regex:
  my @numbers = $acct_trtmt_hsty =~ m/'([789])'/g;
  print join ":", @numbers;

[download]
Substitution example (subtracts 4 from every number): 
$acct_trtmt_hsty, =~ s/(')([789])(')/$1 . ($2-4) . $3/eg;   # note: ma
+ny different ways to write this regex

[download]

In reply to Re: Yet another regex question by davidrw
in thread Yet another regex question by gregor-e

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.