From: Daniel Waite <rabbitblue@...>
Date: 2007-10-31T08:33:05+09:00
Subject: Re: Why, oh, why, little regexp?

Joel VanderWerf wrote:
>> What I'd like is to grab all the "words" in the string. So in the above
>> example I'd like two matches, cost and tax.
>> 
>> Any ideas?
> 
> 'cost * tax'.scan(/\w+/)
> => ["cost", "tax"]

How do you people do that? The last time I had a regexp question someone 
came down from the clouds and handed me something about that short. Why 
do I think it's more difficult than it is?

After making the example a little more complex I had to change it 
every-so-slightly...

'cost * tax + 0.075'.scan(/[a-z]+/)
=> ["cost", "tax"]

But it's effectively the same. Thank you Joel, you rock!

Is there a book you recommend to learn more about regular expressions? 
How did YOU learn them?

>> PS: match(...).captures always, always returns an empty array...
> How are you using it?
> 
> "foo".match(/(foo)/).captures
> => ["foo"]
> 'cost * tax'.match(/([a-z]+)*/).captures
> => ["cost"]

LOL I'm an idiot -- *captures* -- back references, right. Gotcha...
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