From: Robert Klemme <shortcutter@...>
Date: 2008-10-06T01:18:22+09:00
Subject: Re: Explain this ruby regex

On 03.10.2008 18:44, Patrick Doyle wrote:
> The key idea here is that "*" means "match zero or more of" whereas "+"
> means "match one or more of".  So, when you match \w* against "one two",
> there are zero or more instances of a word character (3, in fact, 'o', 'n',
> and 'e'), so that produces one result.  Following that result, there are
> zero matches of a word character, but since you asked for "zero or more of",
> you get that empty string result.  Later, rinse, repeat for the "two" part.

It boils down to this statement: a subexpression with "*" potentially 
matches an _empty string anywhere_ in a string.

Kind regards

	robert