Note that the regex (/^[*]|[a-zA-Z]|\d+\./)does not match what the OP wants.

The regex should contain a group or the '^' needs to be repeated.

That is: /^(?:[*]|[a-zA-Z]|\d+\.)/ OR /^[*]|^[a-zA-Z]|^\d+\./

(The regex as posted will return true when it contains a letter somewhere in the string)

Update: an example was requested but that request was later removed.

Anyway: an example as requesetd:

#!/usr/bin/perl

use warnings;
use strict;

my @chunks = <DATA>;
for (@chunks) {
    print unless /^[*]|[a-zA-Z]|\d+\./;
}

__DATA__
a
@
b
@ d
e

[download]

Output: 

@

The lines 'a', 'b', 'e' are rejected. (ok)
The line '@' is not rejected. (ok)
The line '@ d' is rejected. (not ok)

As far as I can tell '@ d' does not start with a '*'. It also does not start with a word and it also does not start with a number followed by a '.'

In reply to Re^2: regex to match words and numbers by Animator
in thread regex to match words and numbers by doubledecker

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