Why do people defend the regex syntax? [closed]

Answer 1

I think an SQL-like regular expression language would be a fascinating project. I'd love to see someone create that.

Why not have a language where you can write

LOOK FOR "

THEN WORDBOUNDARY THEN ZERO-OR-MORE NOT('>') FOLLOWED-BY '>'

THEN ZERO-OR-MORE SOMETHING REMEMBERED

THEN NEAREST ""

I'm not sure who's the target audience though -- I don't think I would use it, because I've spent all this time learning regexes.

Surely the set of 'people who need to use an expression as complex as that' pretty much maps to the set of programmers who have to deal with stuff just as complex and more on a daily basis?