in reply to using s/// to remove file extensions

You're confusing Perl's regular expressions with shell filename globbing rules. Using YAPE::Regex::Explain thusly:
#!/usr/bin/perl use warnings; use strict; use YAPE::Regex::Explain; my $re = qr/[A-Z]*.pdf/; print YAPE::Regex::Explain->new($re)->explain;
gives
The regular expression: (?-imsx:[A-Z]*.pdf) matches as follows: NODE EXPLANATION ---------------------------------------------------------------------- (?-imsx: group, but do not capture (case-sensitive) (with ^ and $ matching normally) (with . not matching \n) (matching whitespace and # normally): ---------------------------------------------------------------------- [A-Z]* any character of: 'A' to 'Z' (0 or more times (matching the most amount possible)) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- . any character except \n ---------------------------------------------------------------------- pdf 'pdf' ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ) end of grouping ----------------------------------------------------------------------

davis
Kids, you tried your hardest, and you failed miserably. The lesson is: Never try.