in reply to Strip user-defined words with regexp

I would do it this way. I don't know if it deserves an high grade, but it gets the job done :).

my $count = 0;
while ( $message =~ /([A-Za-z0-9]+)/g) {
    last if $count++ > 1;
    print "$1\n";
}

[download]

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Re: Re: Strip user-defined words with regexp
by Limbic~Region (Chancellor) on Mar 04, 2004 at 14:54 UTC
    rnahi,
    "but it gets the job done :)."

    Sorry to nitpick, but actually it doesn't. The first two words were being desired of each sentence.
    L~R

    Updated to clarify Updated is in italics. I am still wrong because of a misinterpretation of the OP's requirements.

[reply]

      Did you try it?

      It prints the first 2 words as defined by the OP.

[reply]
        rnahi,
        Yes I did - against the $msg in my post. The problem is my original understanding of the OP's requirements. I was thinking there would be multiple sentences in a given string and the first two words of each sentence was required. There has been clarification of the requirements and you are correct - sorry.

        Cheers - L~R

[reply]
      I think my original post was a bit too unclear.

      I am looking for at most the first two words. So it may be zero, one or two.

      I've modified his code to: 
      my $firstWord = undef;
my $secondWord = undef;
my $i = 0;
while ($message =~ /([A-Za-z0-9]+)/g) {
    if ($i == 0) {
        $firstWord = $1;
    }
    elsif ($i == 1) {
        $secondWord = $1;
        last;
    }
    $i++;
}

      [download]
      which does exactly what I was looking for. I only tried to do it in one regexp.

      Thanks, Marcel
[reply]
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