...I have a question about the backtrack control assertions : :: and :::.
Do any of them cause the regex to fail entirely? That is, not fail and try again from a different position in the string, but fail utterly? My understanding is they don't, which is why there's <commit>, but I just wanted to be sure of this.
Nope. Theoretically (IIRC):
: fail this atom :: fail this group ::: fail this rule :::: fail this regex
But Larry decided that :::: was going just a bit too far, so he named it <commit> instead.
-- Brent "Dax" Royal-Gordon <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Perl and Parrot hacker
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia.
