PHP - Regular Expressions

Regular expressions are nothing more than a sequence or pattern of characters itself.
They provide the foundation for pattern-matching functionality.

Using regular expression you can search a particular string inside a another string, you
can replace one string by another string and you can split a string into many chunks.

PHP offers functions specific to two sets of regular expression functions, each
corresponding to a certain type of regular expression. You can use any of them based
on your comfort.

 POSIX Regular Expressions

 PERL Style Regular Expressions

POSIX Regular Expressions

The structure of a POSIX regular expression is not dissimilar to that of a typical
arithmetic expression: various elements (operators) are combined to form more
complex expressions.

The simplest regular expression is one that matches a single character, such as g,
inside strings such as g, haggle, or bag.

Lets give explanation for few concepts being used in POSIX regular expression. After
that we will introduce you with regular expression related functions.
Brackets

Brackets ([]) have a special meaning when used in the context of regular expressions.
They are used to find a range of characters.

Sr.No Expression & Description

1
[0-9]
It matches any decimal digit from 0 through 9.

2
[a-z]
It matches any character from lower-case a through lowercase z.
 3
[A-Z]
It matches any character from uppercase A through uppercase Z.

4
[a-Z]
It matches any character from lowercase a through uppercase Z.

The ranges shown above are general; you could also use the range [0-3] to match any
decimal digit ranging from 0 through 3, or the range [b-v] to match any lowercase
character ranging from b through v.
Quantifiers

The frequency or position of bracketed character sequences and single characters can
be denoted by a special character. Each special character having a specific
connotation. The +, *, ?, {int. range}, and $ flags all follow a character sequence.

Sr.No Expression & Description

1
p+
It matches any string containing at least one p.

2
p*
It matches any string containing zero or more p's.

3
p?
It matches any string containing zero or one p's.

4
p{N}
It matches any string containing a sequence of N p's

5
p{2,3}
It matches any string containing a sequence of two or three p's.

6
p{2, }
 It matches any string containing a sequence of at least two p's.

7
p$
It matches any string with p at the end of it.

8
^p
It matches any string with p at the beginning of it.

Examples

Following examples will clear your concepts about matching characters.

Sr.N Expression & Description

o

1
[^a-zA-Z]
It matches any string not containing any of the characters ranging from a through
z and A through Z.

2
p.p
It matches any string containing p, followed by any character, in turn followed by
another p.

3
^.{2}$
It matches any string containing exactly two characters.

4
<b>(.*)</b>
It matches any string enclosed within <b> and </b>.

5
p(hp)*
It matches any string containing a p followed by zero or more instances of the
sequence php.
Predefined Character Ranges

For your programming convenience several predefined character ranges, also known
as character classes, are available. Character classes specify an entire range of
characters, for example, the alphabet or an integer set −

Sr.N Expression & Description

o

1
[[:alpha:]]
It matches any string containing alphabetic characters aA through zZ.

2
[[:digit:]]
It matches any string containing numerical digits 0 through 9.

3
[[:alnum:]]
It matches any string containing alphanumeric characters aA through zZ and 0
through 9.

4
[[:space:]]
It matches any string containing a space.

PHP's Regexp POSIX Functions

PHP currently offers seven functions for searching strings using POSIX-style regular
expressions −

Sr.N Function & Description

o

1 ereg()

The ereg() function searches a string specified by string for a string specified by
pattern, returning true if the pattern is found, and false otherwise.

2 ereg_replace()
 The ereg_replace() function searches for string specified by pattern and replaces
pattern with replacement if found.

3 eregi()

The eregi() function searches throughout a string specified by pattern for a string
specified by string. The search is not case sensitive.

4 eregi_replace()

The eregi_replace() function operates exactly like ereg_replace(), except that the
search for pattern in string is not case sensitive.

5 split()

The split() function will divide a string into various elements, the boundaries of
each element based on the occurrence of pattern in string.

6 spliti()

The spliti() function operates exactly in the same manner as its sibling split(),
except that it is not case sensitive.

7 sql_regcase()

The sql_regcase() function can be thought of as a utility function, converting each

character in the input parameter string into a bracketed expression containing two
characters.

PERL Style Regular Expressions

Perl-style regular expressions are similar to their POSIX counterparts. The POSIX
syntax can be used almost interchangeably with the Perl-style regular expression
functions. In fact, you can use any of the quantifiers introduced in the previous POSIX
section.

Lets give explanation for few concepts being used in PERL regular expressions. After
that we will introduce you wih regular expression related functions.
Meta characters

A meta character is simply an alphabetical character preceded by a backslash that acts

to give the combination a special meaning.
For instance, you can search for large money sums using the '\d' meta character: /([\d]
+)000/, Here \d will search for any string of numerical character.

Following is the list of meta characters which can be used in PERL Style Regular
Expressions.
Character Description
. a single character
\s a whitespace character (space, tab, newline)
\S non-whitespace character
\d a digit (0-9)
\D a non-digit
\w a word character (a-z, A-Z, 0-9, _)
\W a non-word character
[aeiou] matches a single character in the given set
[^aeiou] matches a single character outside the given set
(foo|bar|baz) matches any of the alternatives specified

Modifiers

Several modifiers are available that can make your work with regexps much easier, like
case sensitivity, searching in multiple lines etc.
Modifier Description
i Makes the match case insensitive
m Specifies that if the string has newline or carriage
return characters, the ^ and $ operators will now
match against a newline boundary, instead of a
string boundary
o Evaluates the expression only once
s Allows use of . to match a newline character
x Allows you to use white space in the expression for clarity
g Globally finds all matches
cg Allows a search to continue even after a global match fails

PHP's Regexp PERL Compatible Functions

PHP offers following functions for searching strings using Perl-compatible regular
expressions −

Sr.N Function & Description

o

1 preg_match()

The preg_match() function searches string for pattern, returning true if pattern
 exists, and false otherwise.

2 preg_match_all()

The preg_match_all() function matches all occurrences of pattern in string.

3 preg_replace()

The preg_replace() function operates just like ereg_replace(), except that regular
expressions can be used in the pattern and replacement input parameters.

4 preg_split()

The preg_split() function operates exactly like split(), except that regular
expressions are accepted as input parameters for pattern.

5 preg_grep()

The preg_grep() function searches all elements of input_array, returning all

elements matching the regexp pattern.

6 preg_ quote()

Quote regular expression characters