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--></style><title>Regular Expressions Engine 2.3b
(PPC,Wintel,HP-UX,Gene</title></head><body>
<div>Version 2.3b of the Perl-Style Regular Expression engine plugin
is now available. Ports have been made to Macintosh (PPC),
Wintel and HP-UX platforms, and the plugin is now believed in
condition for easy porting to most new platforms.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>Executables, source codes and revised documentation (online and
downloadable) are now available at:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab><http://www.gate.net/~werdna/RePlugin.html></div>
<div><br></div>
<div>In response to the virtually unanimous comments regarding 2.3a,
revision 2.3b now substantially improves the interface to the Regex
engine with an efficient and straightforward set of messages that
mostly operate on the subject string, as in the present match:
message.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>sourceString reMatch: pattern [from: from] [to: to] [opt:
oStr]</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>for direct matching;</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>sourceString reMatch: pattern [opt: oStr] collect: aBlock
[num: num]</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>for global matching without substitution; and</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>sourceString reMatch: pattern [opt: oStr] sub: aBlock [num:
num]</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>and</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>patString asRePattern</div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>patString asRePatternOpt: oStr</div>
<div><x-tab>
</x-tab>patString asRePatternOpt: oStr onErrorRun: aBlock</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>to return an object encapsulating the compiled regular expression
for efficient matching in an inner loop.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><pattern> can now be either a string or a pre-compiled
pattern. The compiler routinly caches the last dozen or so
strings for speedy matching without recompilation, particularly in
loops using only a few patterns. String substitution was revised
for a substantial speedup.</div>
<div><br></div>
<div>A summary of changes follows:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2"><b>Version 2.3b </b></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Substantially revise String
convenience messages to serve as primary user interface to RePlugin.
</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Implement pattern compile caching.
</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Implement pattern match default
caching. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Order of magnitude performance
improvement in global substitution routines. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Implement modern Perl5 semantics for
global matching and replacement. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Minor bug fixes. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Permit use of compiled patterns as
reMatch: parameter. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Plugin code changed so that
semantics for '\n' and '\r' are hard-coded across all plugins to
conform to Squeak standards regardless of variations in local hardware
c libraries. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Plugin code memory management scheme
modified to permit compilation on most non-Macintosh systems.
</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Plugin code changed to automatically
incorporate RePlugin class comment in the generated plugin header.
</font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Release Wintel Plugin </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Release HP-UX Plugin </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2"><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2"><b>Version 2.3a</b> -- Release
MacPPC Plugin. </font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2"><br></font></div>
<div><font face="Times" size="+2">Thanks very much to everyone who
reviewed and commented on 2.3a, and thanks in particular to Markus
Kohler and Stephen Pair for assistance with the ports.</font></div>
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