regular expressions in filters
Add Regular Expression function to Filters.
Regular Expressions are essentially a user-accessible programming language that makes Filters more precise/accurate/powerful.
For example, "John" is not the same as "John Smith", but, if I ask for "John", I get both, plus "John Jones", etc. But, "^John$" means just "John" on the line.
RegEx may also significantly speed up AOL's processing and reduce the number of filters people want, which reduces AOL's processing load. For example, "Home *Warranty" (notice the " *" which matches zero or more spaces) matches "HomeWarranty", "Home Warranty", and "Home Warranty". This is very useful for rerouting junk mail that tries to avoid filters, one filter instead of three (or more).
There are some VERY well-defined rules about how to use the feature, and even libraries that are readily available to implement the feature.
In fact, I'd be surprised if it is not already part of Spam detection.
Matthew Miner
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