RE: [PHP] newbie question about preg_match

[Chris W. Parker]

Al 
on Thursday, May 20, 2004 12:51 PM said:

> If I have multiple instances that match the pattern, but only want the
> first one, which is the best way to handle it?

reread the last sentence in John's post.

> John W. Holmes wrote:
> 
>> From: "Al" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

[snip]

>> Note that this will only return one match when there could be more,
>> depending upon your string. If you want all of them, use
>> preg_match_all(). 



hth,
chris.

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Re: [PHP] newbie question about preg_match

[Al]

If I have multiple instances that match the pattern, but only want the 
first one, which is the best way to handle it?

Putting the "U" flag seems to work, but I don't understand the full 
implications of using it here. 

preg_match("|$start(.*?)$end |Ui", $contents, $text);
Alternatively, I could use preg_match_all and use $text [1]. 

Thanks
John W. Holmes wrote:
From: "Al" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
 

I'm trying to compose a general purpose text snip expression to extract
a text segment from a string.
Should this work for all reasonable cases?  It seems to work for several
test strings.
$start= "str1";
$end= "str2";
preg_match ("|$start (.*) ? $end |i", $contents, $text);
$segment= $text[1];
   

Looks like you have some extra spaces in there that'll mess it up. The '?'
for example, is only applying to the space before it.
You want
preg_match("|$start(.*?)$end |i", $contents, $text);
Note that this will only return one match when there could be more,
depending upon your string. If you want all of them, use preg_match_all().
---John Holmes...
 

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Re: [PHP] newbie question about preg_match

[John W. Holmes]

From: "Al" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

> I'm trying to compose a general purpose text snip expression to extract
> a text segment from a string.
>
> Should this work for all reasonable cases?  It seems to work for several
> test strings.
>
> $start= "str1";
>
> $end= "str2";
>
> preg_match ("|$start (.*) ? $end |i", $contents, $text);
>
> $segment= $text[1];

Looks like you have some extra spaces in there that'll mess it up. The '?'
for example, is only applying to the space before it.

You want

preg_match("|$start(.*?)$end |i", $contents, $text);

Note that this will only return one match when there could be more,
depending upon your string. If you want all of them, use preg_match_all().

---John Holmes...

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