Question

I have

print $str;
abcd*%1234$sdfsd..#d

The string would always have only one continuous stretch of numbers, like 1234 in this case. Rest all will be either alphabets or other special characters.

How can I extract the number (1234 in this case) and store it back in str?

This page suggests that I should use \d, but how?

Answer 1

$str =~ s/\D//g;

This removes all nondigit characters from the string. That’s all that you need to do.

EDIT: if Unicode digits in other scripts may be present, a better solution is:

$str =~ s/[^0-9]//g;