On Fri, 15 Dec 2000, Deven T. Corzine wrote:
> If we want the first interesting match, and we're preferring early matches
> and short matches, I believe that "bccccd" is more interesting.
then write a regex that describes that pattern. the pattern is
one b
followed by
some stuff that is not a d
up to
one d
you complain because the "." regex special character does not do what you
want. it matches any character except a newline. however, for the case
you provide, you don't want any character except a newline. so, your use
of "." is your problem, along with your refusal to realize that what you
are dealing with is a set of rules, and if you grok the rules, you can do
what you want. it has nothing to do with opinion or intuition. neither
of those have any place in a completely (well, almost ;) described,
human-designed system. this isn't nuclear physics after all.
your trouble is not with greediness or shortest matches, as i said before.
you just don't understand what you are doing and refuse to beleive
otherwise.
--
brian d foy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Director of Technology, Smith Renaud, Inc.
875 Avenue of the Americas, 2510, New York, NY 10001
V: (212) 239-8985
