How to use regular expression with ANY array operator

I use this:

create or replace function regexp_match_array(a text[], regexp text)
returns boolean
strict immutable
language sql as $_$
select exists (select * from unnest(a) as x where x ~ regexp);
$_$;

comment on function regexp_match_array(text[], text) is
  'returns TRUE if any element of a matches regexp';

create operator ~ (
 procedure=regexp_match_array,
 leftarg=text[], rightarg=text
);

comment on operator ~(text[], text) is
  'returns TRUE if any element of ARRAY (left) matches REGEXP (right); think ANY(ARRAY) ~ REGEXP';

Then use it much like you'd use ~ with text scalars:

=> select distinct gl from x where gl ~ 'SH' and array_length(gl,1) < 7;
┌──────────────────────────────────────┐
│                  gl                  │
├──────────────────────────────────────┤
│ {MSH6}                               │
│ {EPCAM,MLH1,MSH2,MSH6,PMS2}          │
│ {SH3TC2}                             │
│ {SHOC2}                              │
│ {BRAF,KRAS,MAP2K1,MAP2K2,SHOC2,SOS1} │
│ {MSH2}                               │
└──────────────────────────────────────┘
(6 rows)

SELECT * FROM book where   EXISTS ( SELECT * from unnest(author) as X where x ~* '^p' )  

The first obvious idea is to use your own regexp-matching operator with commuted arguments:

create function commuted_regexp_match(text,text) returns bool as
'select $2 ~* $1;'
language sql;

create operator ~!@# (
 procedure=commuted_regexp_match(text,text),
 leftarg=text, rightarg=text
);

Then you may use it like this:

SELECT '^p' ~!@# ANY(authors) FROM book;

---

Another different way of looking at it to unnest the array and formulate in SQL the equivalent of the ANY construct:

select bool_or(r) from 
  (select author ~* '^j' as r
    from (select unnest(authors) as author from book) s1 
  ) s2;