On Jan 16, 2008 8:03 PM, Wolfgang NáÅasi-Donner <ed.odanow / wonado.de> wrote:
> Rick Denatale wrote:
> > Something like this?
> > irb(main):001:0> "frabelious" =~ /a.*?e.*?i.*?o.*?u/
> > => 2
>
> This doesn't work as expected...
>
> irb(main):001:0> "xaxxixxexxixxuxxoxxuxx".match(/a.*?e.*?i.*?o.*?u/)[0]
> => "axxixxexxixxuxxoxxu"
>
> ..., because it allows all wovels in any order in the word, if there is
> one possible grouping with the wanted ordering - The subpattern "a.*?e"
> for example allows any number of "a"s, "i"s, "o"s, and "u"s between the
> "a" and the "e".
>
> Wolfgang NáÅasi-Donner
> --
>
> Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
>
>

try something like:
/a+[^a]*e+[^ae]*i+[^aei]*o+[^aeio]*u+/