regex problem for newbie ranges of numbers

Question

I really should polish up on my regex but for now can anyone help with this...

((2,3,4,11,8),(5,44,67,78,32,22,111,234))

as you can see, each range of numbers is comma separated and, in this example, there are 2 ranges of of numbers.

In a live scenario there could be many numbers and a handful of ranges.

So... how do i extract something like this into a php nested array or something similar?

ANY help appreciated

Are they always nested at a depth of two? So, a single range of one number would be ((1)) - and three ranges of numbers, each three long, would look like ((1,2,3),(4,5,6),(7,8,9))? — James Kolpack
– James Kolpack, Commented Sep 13, 2010 at 18:45

shamittomar · Accepted Answer · 2010-09-13 18:54:40Z

5

Use explode() wisely and do it like this:

$ranges = '((2,3,4,11,8),(5,44,67,78,32,22,111,234))';

//break into groups
$array = explode('),(', $ranges);

//trim any parenthesis left and then split by comma ,
foreach($array as &$group)
    $group = explode(',',trim($group, '()'));

//display result
var_dump($array);

This outputs:

array
  0 => 
    array
      0 => string '2' (length=1)
      1 => string '3' (length=1)
      2 => string '4' (length=1)
      3 => string '11' (length=2)
      4 => string '8' (length=1)
  1 => &
    array
      0 => string '5' (length=1)
      1 => string '44' (length=2)
      2 => string '67' (length=2)
      3 => string '78' (length=2)
      4 => string '32' (length=2)
      5 => string '22' (length=2)
      6 => string '111' (length=3)
      7 => string '234' (length=3)

answered Sep 13, 2010 at 18:54

shamittomar

46.8k12 gold badges77 silver badges81 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

Comments

dave · Accepted Answer · 2010-09-13 19:09:45Z

3

$input = str_replace(array('(', ')'), array('[', ']'), $input);
$output = json_decode($input);

This might work as well

edited Sep 13, 2010 at 19:09

user3850

answered Sep 13, 2010 at 18:57

dave

1,6473 gold badges16 silver badges21 bronze badges

3 Comments

gen_Eric Over a year ago

Needs to be $input = str_replace("(", "[", $input); and $input = str_replace(")", "]", $input);

user3850 Over a year ago

maybe it's even possible to get the input in json from the start

khany Over a year ago

the storage format is arbitrary. how would a JSON string look? I think the first str_replace could be changed to preg_replace to accommodate arrays.

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

regex problem for newbie ranges of numbers

2 Answers 2

Comments

3 Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

Comments

3 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related