[thelist] [RFI] regex article input

[Burhan Khalid]

Joshua Olson wrote:
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: Edwin Martin
>>Sent: Friday, February 25, 2005 5:14 AM
>>
>>Your example with DOS wildcards doesn't help because 95% (my 
>>estimate) 
>>of people younger than 35 years don't know what DOS is.
> 
> 
> I'd reckon that this % is off a bit.  If you extend it to the whole world,
> then you are probably correct.  If you only look at people younger than 35
> who are interested in programming, I'd say that number is probably much
> closer to zero that 100...  DOS is more than just an old fogey tool.  :-)
> Windows 95 was the first time the PC got remotely unmarried from the concept
> of interfacing with the DOS prompt, so most anybody older than about 26 and
> into computers has probably used the DOS prompt.

Anyone (no matter their age) that have used Linux or UNIX also knows 
what is a wildcard.

Also, a lot of people don't know it, but they are using wildcards all 
the time (even in Windows).  A colleague of mine, who has no programming 
or computer experience, knows that when he types *.* in any file dialog 
box (such the one you get in Word's File --> Open) he will get a listing 
of everything in the folder.

I once told him that what he is using is a wildcard -- his reply, "Well, 
of course it is -- it makes sense for it to be" -- as if he invented the 
concept :)