more than 100 capturing groups in a regex

[D H]

Fredrik Lundh wrote:
> Joerg Schuster wrote:
> 
> 
>>>if you want to know why 100 is a reasonable and non-random choice, I
>>>suggest checking the RE documentation for "99 groups" and the special
>>>meaning of group 0.
>>
>>I have read everything I found about Python regular expressions. But I
>>am not able to understand what you mean. What is so special about 99?
> 
> 
> it's the largest number than can be written with two decimal digits.


It's a conflict between python's syntax for regex back references and 
octal number literals.  Probably wasn't noticed until way too late, and 
now it will never change.