Re: extract a specific string from input

.* will get you the longest sequence of characters.

.*? will get you the shortest sequence.

Comment on Re: extract a specific string from input

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Re^2: extract a specific string from input by moritz (Cardinal) on Sep 26, 2012 at 11:57 UTC
.? will get you the shortest sequence. Usually that's correct, but not if there is overlap between the stand and the end delimiter. `ATTAA` is the shortest sequence that begins wtih ATT and ends with TAA, but `ATT.?TAA` doesn't match it. If overlapping matches need to be allowed, you can use for example `/((?=ATT).*?TAA)/` [download] Perl 6 - the future is here, just unevenly distributed	[reply] [d/l] [select]