CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phppreg-match
Abul Hasnat
Abul Hasnat

Reputation: 1631

preg match in php grabs the whole string?

I am trying to match a string from a large string.

example

"quick brown fox is here but quick brown fox always over there too" 

 preg_match('(quick brown fox(.+?)too)',$txt,$match)

the problem is it grabs the whole sentence rather than "quick brown fox always over there too"

How do I grab only the second part?..this happens when there are similar strings are together in one line or so...

Upvotes: 1

Views: 159

Answers (2)

pozs
pozs

Reputation: 36244

Non-greedyness is applied only at the end of the pattern (actually, it means, that if prce finds a match, doesn't look for a larger match, just returns), so:

"quick brown fox is here too, and always over there too"

preg_match('(quick brown fox(.+?)too)', $txt, $match)

would match only "quick brown fox is here too" - but nothing, what you're looking for.

Maybe you could reverse your $txt with strrev() & write a reversed pattern, than reverse your matches too, but it will only solve this specific problem.

Upvotes: 1

CAMason
CAMason

Reputation: 1122

You have 2 capturing groups here. Your $match array will contain..

[0] => quick brown fox is here but quick brown fox always over there too
[1] => quick brown fox is here but quick brown fox always over there too
[2] => is here but quick brown fox always over there

Also, you're missing the two forward slashes in your regex.

Upvotes: 1

Related Questions