How can I find the location of a regex match in Perl?

The built-in variables @- and @+ hold the start and end positions, respectively, of the last successful match. $-[0] and $+[0] correspond to entire pattern, while $-[N] and $+[N] correspond to the $N ($1, $2, etc.) submatches.

Forget my previous post, I've got a better idea.

sub match_positions {
    my ($regex, $string) = @_;
    return if not $string =~ /$regex/;
    return ($-[0], $+[0]);
}
sub match_all_positions {
    my ($regex, $string) = @_;
    my @ret;
    while ($string =~ /$regex/g) {
        push @ret, [ $-[0], $+[0] ];
    }
    return @ret
}

This technique doesn't change the regex in any way.

Edited to add: to quote from perlvar on $1..$9. "These variables are all read-only and dynamically scoped to the current BLOCK." In other words, if you want to use $1..$9, you cannot use a subroutine to do the matching.