From owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Thu Jan 23 20:57:05 2014 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [8.8.178.115]) (using TLSv1 with cipher ADH-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id A740D3C7; Thu, 23 Jan 2014 20:57:05 +0000 (UTC) Received: from wonkity.com (wonkity.com [67.158.26.137]) (using TLSv1 with cipher DHE-RSA-AES256-SHA (256/256 bits)) (No client certificate requested) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTPS id E2E8419FA; Thu, 23 Jan 2014 20:57:04 +0000 (UTC) Received: from wonkity.com (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by wonkity.com (8.14.7/8.14.7) with ESMTP id s0NKv3NP080736; Thu, 23 Jan 2014 13:57:03 -0700 (MST) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Received: from localhost (wblock@localhost) by wonkity.com (8.14.7/8.14.7/Submit) with ESMTP id s0NKv3rH080733; Thu, 23 Jan 2014 13:57:03 -0700 (MST) (envelope-from wblock@wonkity.com) Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2014 13:57:03 -0700 (MST) From: Warren Block To: "'Devin Teske'" Subject: RE: awk programming question In-Reply-To: <04a201cf1878$8ebce540$ac36afc0$@FreeBSD.org> Message-ID: References: <20140123185604.4cbd7611@gumby.homeunix.com> <04a201cf1878$8ebce540$ac36afc0$@FreeBSD.org> User-Agent: Alpine 2.00 (BSF 1167 2008-08-23) MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed X-Greylist: Sender IP whitelisted, not delayed by milter-greylist-4.4.3 (wonkity.com [127.0.0.1]); Thu, 23 Jan 2014 13:57:03 -0700 (MST) Cc: 'RW' , freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-BeenThere: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.17 Precedence: list List-Id: User questions List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Thu, 23 Jan 2014 20:57:05 -0000 On Thu, 23 Jan 2014, dteske@FreeBSD.org wrote: >> From: RW [mailto:rwmaillists@googlemail.com] >> Note that awk supports +, but not newfangled things like *. > > With respect to regex, what awk really needs is the quantifier syntax... > > * = {0,} = zero or more > + = {1,} = one or more > {x,y} = any quantity from x inclusively up to y > {x,} = any quantity from x or more I think RW meant to type that awk did not have the newfangled "?" for non-greedy matches.