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There are two types of alternation in Raku's regex: the | and ||. What is the difference ?

say 'foobar' ~~ / foo || foobar /  # 「foo」
say 'foobar' ~~ / foo | foobar /   # 「foobar」
Tinmarino
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1 Answers1

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  • The || is the old alternation behaviour: try alternation from the first declared to the last

  • The | try alternation from the longest to the shortest declarative atom. It is called the Longest Token Matching Spec strategy.

say 'foobar' ~~ / foo || foobar /  # 「foo」 is the first declared
say 'foobar' ~~ / foo | foobar /   # 「foobar」 is the longest token

More detailed answer in this post

Elizabeth Mattijsen
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Tinmarino
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