A simple fix would be to do a few checks before you make the substitution:
use strict;
use warnings;
use Data::Dumper qw{Dumper};
my %hash = (
'GREETING1' => 'HAI',
'GREETING2' => 'HELLO',
);
my $value = '-GREETING1- James -POSITION- -GREETING2- -FOO-';
## find potential matches
my @matches = $value =~ m/-([^\-\s]+)-/g;
## give summary
print "" . (scalar@matches) . " matches for >>$value<<:\n" . (Dumper \
+@matches);
## check each potential match before substituting
for my $match (@matches){
if (exists$hash{$match}){ # recognised?
## make substitution, including updates on string
print "\t>$match< replaced:\n";
print "\tWAS : $value\n";
$value =~s/-$match-/$hash{$match}/;
print "\tNOW : $value\n";
}
else { print "$match not replaced.\n"; }
}
Gives:
4 matches for >>-GREETING1- James -POSITION- -GREETING2- -FOO-<<:
$VAR1 = [
'GREETING1',
'POSITION',
'GREETING2',
'FOO'
];
>GREETING1< replaced:
WAS : -GREETING1- James -POSITION- -GREETING2- -FOO-
NOW : HAI James -POSITION- -GREETING2- -FOO-
POSITION not replaced.
>GREETING2< replaced:
WAS : HAI James -POSITION- -GREETING2- -FOO-
NOW : HAI James -POSITION- HELLO -FOO-
FOO not replaced.
Not a one liner, but maybe a bit clearer to follow and easier to expand later... HTH!
Updated: Added some comments...
Just a something something...