Re: RFC 150 (v1) Extend regex syntax to provide for return of a hash of matched subpatterns

[Tom Christiansen]

This is useful in that it would stop being number dependent.
For example, you can't now safely say

    /$var (foo) \1/

and guarantee for arbitrary contents of $var that your you have
the right number backref anymore.  

If I recall correctly, the Python folks addressed this.  One
might check that.

--tom