note ikegami <p>It returns the <em>string</em> <c>(?-xism:[@*+])</c> <ol> <li><c>qr/[%s]/</c> builds a regex that matches strings containing "<c>%</c>" or "<c>s</c>". <li><c>sprintf</c> stringifies the compiled regex to <c>(?-xism:[%s])</c> to use it as the format pattern. <li>The characters are included into the format pattern and the result is returned by <c>sprintf</c>. </ol> <p>So not only do you not end up with a compiled pattern, you waste time compiling a pattern you never use! 788420 788429