CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phpregexdatedelimiterpreg-split
Rekha Rani Paul
Rekha Rani Paul

Reputation: 29

preg_split in php to split string at the point which is preceded by digit and is followed by letters or blank space

In order to split my string at the point which is preceded by digit and is followed by letters as:

 $str = '12jan';

I have used

$arr = preg_split('/(?<=[0-9])(?=[a-z]+)/i',$str);

It works file and gives the desired output. I want to update it so that it gives the same output for strings like.

$str='12 jan';
$str='12    jan';
$str='12/jan';
$str='12//jan';
$str='12/jan';
$str='12*/jan';
$str='12*//jan';

The code should work for any strings given above so that at the end of the day I have a array like

Array
(
    [0] => 12
    [1] => jan
)

Any help will be appreciated.

Upvotes: 3

Views: 857

Answers (3)

mickmackusa
mickmackusa

Reputation: 47971

This may be optimized if you answer my question in the comment.

Pattern: ~(?<=[0-9])[*/ ]*(?=[a-z]+)~i

Demo

The above will match zero or more *, / and/or space characters.

On your input strings, this will be just as accurate and faster:

Pattern: ~\d+\K[^a-z]*~i
or: ~\d+\K[*/ ]*~ (no case-sensitive pattern modifier is necessary)

Demo

The above will match zero or more non-alphabetical characters immediately following the leading digit(s).

And of course preg_split's cousins can also do nicely:

Here is a battery of PHP Demos.

$strings=['12jan','12 jan','12    jan','12/jan','12//jan','12/jan','12*/jan','12*//jan'];

foreach($strings as $string){
    var_export(preg_split('~(?<=[0-9])[*/ ]*(?=[a-z]+)~i',$string));
    echo "\n";
    var_export(preg_split('~\d+\K[*/ ]*~',$string));
    echo "\n";
    var_export(preg_match('~(\d+)[/* ]*([a-z]+)~i',$string,$out)?array_slice($out,1):'fail');
    echo "\n";
    var_export(preg_match('~(\d+)[/* ]*(.+)~',$string,$out)?array_slice($out,1):'fail');
    echo "\n";
    var_export(preg_match_all('~\d+|[a-z]+~i',$string,$out)?$out[0]:'fail');
    echo "\n---\n";
}

All methods provide the same output.

Upvotes: 1

Mukesh
Mukesh

Reputation: 150

I have updated your code with preg_match Its gives output what exactly your needs

$str='12/jan';
preg_match('/^(\d*)[\*\s\/]*([a-z]{3})$/i', $str, $match);
print_r($match);

but the output is changed a little bit, It will be like below

array(
  0 => '12/jan', 
  1 => '12', 
  2 => 'jan'
)

Upvotes: 0

t3o
t3o

Reputation: 329

A simple preg_match regexp does it:

foreach (['12 jan', '12    jan', '12/jan', '12//jan', '12/jan',
          '12*/jan', '12*//jan'] as $test)
{
        unset ($matches);
        if (preg_match("#^([0-9]+)[ /*]*(.*)#", $test, $matches)) {
                var_export( [$matches[1], $matches[2]] );
        }
        else {
                print "Failed for '$test'.\n";
        }
}

The regexp is:

  • start with numbers -> group #1
  • have 0 or more of space, slash or stars
  • take all the rest -> group #2

Upvotes: 0

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