Pathological regular expression

[MRAB]

Dotan Cohen wrote:
>> IMHO it's not a bug -- s/hang/takes a long time to compute/
>>
> 
> ‎That is quite what a hang is, and why the timeout was invented. The
> real bug is that there is no timeout mechanism.
> 
I wouldn't call it a "hang" because it is actually doing work. If it was
'stuck' on a certain part of the text and not progressing then it would
be a hang.

>> Just look at it: 2 + operators and 3 * operators ... It's one of those
>> "come back after lunch" REs.
>>
> 
> Some users would not be able to tell that from the beginning. While a
> timeout override would be necessary in these cases, a timeout should
> be set.
>