Re: rx.el sexp regexp syntax

[Helmut Eller]

On Sun, Jun 03 2018, Eric Abrahamsen wrote:

>> Maybe we could start with an ordinary macro, e.g. (pcre "(a|b)"), which
>> could translate Perl/Python regexp syntax to Emacs regexp syntax.
>
> I made something like that, but the only advantage is your example
> above: open and close parentheses, and the vertical bar. Everything else
> still has to be double-backslashed. It feels inconsistent, and isn't
> that much of a benefit...

Any benefit on a small example is bound to be small.  And yes, in
practice most regexps fit on a single line. i.e. they are small.

I'm not sure what you mean with "everything else" as in this example
there's nothing else.  The example would translate to: "\\(a\\|\\b\\)"
which, while it is one character shorter, is also quite ugly.

Maybe you mean that things like \w cannot occur in ordinary strings
without double-backslash.  Hmm.. that's indeed a problem.

Helmut