YAPHacker
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Jan 2, 2001, 10:52 PM
Post #1 of 1
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using precompiled regexes with the //s modifier
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question= HOW DO YOU PRECOMPILE A REGEX SO THAT IT BEHAVES LIKE
s/REGEX_REF/s; ?
According to Damian Conway, qr/^regex$/; returns a reference to a
pre-compiled regular expression; excellent for foreach or while constructs
where it may be interpolated without the overhead of a call to the perl
parsing mechanism with each iteration through the loop. In one of the
modules I'm working on I use regular expressions to parse template files for
in-line perl code embedded in these documents. I use tags like so:
{ $object->{'base'} }% ...in order to interpolate values for variables
defined in my programs. Because I often call on the method in this module
which is responsible for parsing through files in database-driven programs,
using a pre-compiled regular expression can dramatically speed them up.
I have a problem though when I do so. To better explain, I start by showing
the code without pre-compiled regexes:
<perlcode>
$_[0] =~ s/%\{(.*?)\}%/$this->evalu(\$1)/gsex;
</perlcode>
In regexptut - perldocs for regular expressions you can read that where a
regular expression is followed by the modifier /regex$/s it is to match
everything up to the end of the block in question (because of the '$'
anchor) and ignore \n (newline) boundaries. Here's a snippet from the docs:
<perldoc snippet>
Perl allows us to choose between ignoring and paying attention to newlines
by using the (//s) and (//m) modifiers. (//s) and (//m) stand for single
line and multi-line and they determine whether a string is to be treated as
one continuous string, or as a set of lines. The two modifiers affect two
aspects of how the regexp is interpreted: 1) how the '.' character class is
defined, and 2) where the anchors ^ and $ are able to match. Here are the
four possible combinations:
no modifiers (//): Default behavior. '.' matches any character except "\n".
^ matches only at the beginning of the string and $ matches only at the end
or before a newline at the end.
s modifier (//s): Treat string as a single long line. '.' matches any
character, even "\n". ^ matches only at the beginning of the string and $
matches only at the end or before a newline at the end.
m modifier (//m): Treat string as a set of multiple lines. '.' matches any
character except "\n". ^ and $ are able to match at the start or end of any
line within the string.
both s and m modifiers (//sm): Treat string as a single long line, but
detect multiple lines. '.' matches any character, even "\n". ^ and $,
however, are able to match at the start or end of any line within the
string.
</perldoc snippet>
The problem I have when I pre-compile my regex is that I can't compile into
the regex the (//s) modifier's functionality. When I try something like...
<perlcode>
my $regex_ref = qr/%\{(.*?)\}%/;
$_[0] =~ s/$regex_ref/$this->evalu(\$1)/gsex;
</perlcode>
...the behavior of the (//s) modifier is lost and the regex only matches
embedded perl constructs that span one line. Constructs such as the one
below are skipped over...
<embedded perlcode>
%{ ($!) ? qq{<blockquote>
<strong>Process number $processes->[$_] was completed, but warnings were
generated:</strong> $!
</blockquote> } : qq{<blockquote>
<strong>Process number $processes->[$_] was sucessfully completed!</strong>
</blockquote>} }%
</embedded perlcode>
...while ones like this get evaluated just fine...
<embedded perlcode>
Welcome back, %{ $user->{'name'} }%!
</embedded perlcode>
I've even tried making the regex reference like qr/regex/s; but of course
that causes the perl interpreter to throw an exception stating that there is
a syntax error near 'qr/regex/s'. And just in case you are wondering what
$this-evalu(); does, here's the code for that, even though I believe it is
of no consequence to the current problem...
<perlcode>
sub evalu {
my $this = shift;
my $tmp = ${$_[0]};
$tmp =~ s/\$(.*?)->/\$this->{objects}->\{$1\}->/gs;
return(eval($tmp));
}
</perlcode>
All help is very much appreciated. I've looked through all the
documentation I can find, but with no luck for this problem. Please excuse
the length of this posting.
- tommy, yetanother.perlhacker@atrixnet.com
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