Hi team,
The following test, used to validate the “Alternation” stage:
echo -n "I see 1 cat, 2 dogs and 3 cows" | ./your_program.sh -E "^I see (\d (cat|dog|cow)s?(, | and )?)+$"
actually requires our implementation to handle grouping in general, not just alternation grouping. I think this requirement should be made clearer in the task description.
More broadly, I feel the task descriptions could benefit from being a bit more detailed overall.
Hey @FredericLatour, great suggestion!
We’ve simplified the combined test cases for #zm7 Alternation in this PR. Let us know if you’re still running into issues.
Thanks for the feedback — though a bit too late for me, since I had already started implementing generic capturing groups 
On a more general note, it would be really helpful to have clearer guidance on how to handle edge cases. For example:
What if ^ isn’t at the start of a pattern? Should it be treated as a normal character?
What if $ isn’t at the end?
What about something like ab), or two consecutive quantifiers?
I ended up treating those as literals. Since they don’t seem to be covered in your tests, that didn’t stop me from passing the stages.
More precise guidance — or at least showing more of the test cases up front in each stage description — would make things smoother.
That being said, I’m enjoying this challenge. That’s really great to propose free challenges every month.
Thanks
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