Question

Using Perl, I would like to split a string on the comma and the “and” (that may or may not be preceded by a comma.

1. "Apple" gives array (Apple)
2. "Apple and Orange" gives array (Apple Orange)
3. "Apple, Orange, and Banana" gives array (Apple Orange Banana)

For some reason the following split regex is not working for me:

split(/(,| and )/, $string)

Answer 1

Try this:

my @list = split /\s*(?:(?:,\s*)?\band\b|,)\s*/, $string;

Example:

perl -E "say join ':', split /\s*(?:(?:,\s*)?\band\b|,)\s*/, 'apple, orange, and banana'"
apple:orange:banana

Or a simpler working case for your example:

/,? and |, /