Subject: Re: the state of regex(3)
To: Alistair Crooks <agc@pkgsrc.org>
From: Jaromir Dolecek <jdolecek@NetBSD.org>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 09/28/2004 19:15:21
Alistair Crooks wrote:
> 	The licence under which PCRE is released has been changed to the more
> 	conventional "BSD" licence.
> 
>	...
> 
> Assuming that the internal rearrangements have not clobbered the performance
> in any way, is there any reason to stay with the old regex(3) implementation?

Sentiment? :) How well tested is the BRE support?

> Shouldn't we just move to pcre?

Please! PCRE is very fast, actively maintained and widely used. I'm sure
we'd find plenty of uses for the extended perl-compatible REs within
our base as well. Since the licence is BSD-like (even without advertising
clause), it'd be clear win.

Jaromir
-- 
Jaromir Dolecek <jdolecek@NetBSD.org>            http://www.NetBSD.cz/
-=- We should be mindful of the potential goal, but as the Buddhist -=-
-=- masters say, ``You may notice during meditation that you        -=-
-=- sometimes levitate or glow.   Do not let this distract you.''   -=-