You need to use eq to compare strings. Using "==" is treating the strings as numbers for the comparison.

Update: Since you appear to be comparing versions, you might also be interested in:

• Modules for comparing version numbers?
• Ordered Comparison of Generalized Version Strings.

And more generally, Super Search really is super.

my $x = '5.1';
my $y = '5.1.1';

if($x =~ /5.1/)
  { 
    print "X equals 5.1 \n";
  }
if($y =~ /5.1.1/)
  {
    print "Y equals 5.1.1 \n";
  }
[download]

There are several things wrong with /5.1/
• "." inside a regex is special - it matches any character except "\n".
• the regex will match any string that contains the sequence 5, "any char except \n", 1. ie it will match (for example) "501", "5:1", "I have 5.1 experience points"
The solution is to anchor the regex at the start and end of the string, and to escape ".": /^5\.1$/

eq is a far better operator when you want to test if two strings are equal!

See perlretut for a regexp tutorial and perlre for the full monty on regular expressions.

---

Unless I state otherwise, all my code runs with strict and warnings

My mistake on forgetting to add the escape char:  '\' before '.' :)
Thanks.


Es gibt mehr im Leben als Bücher, weißt du. Aber nicht viel mehr. - (Die Smiths)"

oops, how did I miss that special regex meaning of "."?

But you should use anchors in your regex, otherwise it might match, where you don't want it to match

my $x = '5.1.1';


# OOPS
if ( $x =~ m/5.1/ ) {
  print "'$x' is 5.1\n";
}

# better
if ( $x =~ m/^5.1$/ ) {
  print "'$x' is 5.1\n";
}
[download]

update: please read on at FunkyMonks post