2

Sorry for the ambiguous subject, what I'm looking for is to have a string with cyrillic characters that may go like

«Добрый день!» - сказал он, потянувшись…

into an array that goes like

[0] => «
[1] => Добрый␠
[2] => день!»␠-␠
[3] => сказал␠
[4] => он,␠
[5] => потянувшись…

So essentially I'm looking for a break to occur on a border between any character and a cyrillic character ([а-я] range) although this must only be true when we transit from any character to a cyrillic character, not vice versa. I've seen examples that successfully solve this with punctuation characters and latin alphabet with

preg_split('/([^.:!?]+[.:!?]+)/', 'hello:there.everyone!so.how?are:you', NULL, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE | PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY );

but my attempts to repurpose it into something different have so far failed:

preg_split ('/(?<=[^а-я])/ius', $text, NULL, PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);

almost works but it also splits by regular characters such as spaces and punctuation marks and that is not what I want. Clearly there's something wrong with my regex. How should I modify that to get the result as in the example above?

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2
  • why « character is captured as a separate item and the same opposite » is captured as a part of a string день!».. ? Commented Dec 9, 2016 at 22:12
  • Yes, it's not really the best example, I'm willing to sacrifice the [0] there somehow. Commented Dec 9, 2016 at 22:46

4 Answers 4

Reset to default
2

Use the following regex solution:

$s = "«Добрый день!» - сказал он, потянувшись…";
$res = preg_split('/\b(\p{Cyrillic}+\W*)/u', $s, NULL, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE | PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);
print_r($res);
// Array(
//   [0] => «
//   [1] => Добрый 
//   [2] => день!» - 
//   [3] => сказал 
//   [4] => он, 
//   [5] => потянувшись…
//)

See the PHP demo

Details:

  • \b(\p{Cyrillic}+\W*) - matches and captures a whole Cyrillic word with 0+ non-word chars after it
  • The pattern is wrapped with capturing parentheses and PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE will push the captured values into the resulting array
  • PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY will discard empty values in the array
  • /u modifier will make the \b (word boundary) and \W Unicode aware, and will allow processing Unicode strings with regex.
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1 Comment

I really like this elegant solution but when I try it in my own PHP, all I get is just a single line, no splits. It does work in your demo though. Why could that be?
2

How about splitting at an initial \b word boundary with u modifier.

$res = preg_split('/\b(?=\w)(?!^)/u', $str);

The lookahead ensures \b is followed by a word character. (?!^) prevents empty match if start.

See this demo at eval.in

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9 Comments

It is a logical solution but unfortunately I need the breaks to occur only on cyrillic characters so that, for example, "слово word" doesn't get split into two.
@ЗахарJoe In this case you could try $res = preg_split('/\b(?=[^\Wa-z])/iu', $str);
I've just tried the two regexes you provided and unfortunately my version of PHP (5.5.38) for some reason returns just a single array element in both cases.
@ЗахарJoe Probably same issue with preg_split('/\b(?=\p{Cyrillic})/u', $str); similar Wiktor's answer.
It probably is, and it's kinda baffling. I did set mb_internal_encoding ( 'UTF-8' ); and I don't think it should need any other tricks. Wonder what's broken and where.
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1

You have to check also with a look ahead if the next character is a cyrrilic one. This code will do the job:

$t = preg_split ('/(?<=[^а-я])(?=[а-я]+)/ius', $text, NULL, PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);

It gives this output:

Array
(
    [0] => «
    [1] => Добрый 
    [2] => день!» - 
    [3] => сказал 
    [4] => он, 
    [5] => потянувшись…
)

Here you can try it.

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3 Comments

Thank you but I think you should also checkout bobble bubble's answer which seems to be a little more elegant.
Have already voted for this. Another variant: $res = preg_split('/\b(?=[а-я])/iu', $str);
Same story. My PHP disrespects something (although I don't see why it would do that) and only the lookahead variant works.
0

Try this regex: [\x{0400}-\x{04FF}]*[^\x{0400}-\x{04FF}]*. All unicode characters from 0400 to 04FF are considered as cyrillic. It should match exactly what you want. You can also replace \x{0400}-\x{04FF} with \p{Cyrillic} as suggested in another answer.

This is all the characters in that range:
ЀЁЂЃЄЅІЇЈЉЊЋЌЍЎЏ0АБВГДЕЖЗИЙКЛМНОП0РСТУФХЦЧШЩЪЫЬЭЮЯ0абвгдежзийклмнопрстуфхцчшщъыьэюяѐёђѓєѕіїјљњћќѝўџ0460ѠѡѢѣѤѥѦѧѨѩѪѫѬѭѮѯѰѱѲѳѴѵѶѷѸѹѺѻѼѽѾѿҀҁ҂҃҄҅҆҇҈҉ҊҋҌҍҎҏҐґҒғҔҕҖҗҘҙҚқҜҝҞҟҠҡҢңҤҥҦҧҨҩҪҫҬҭҮүҰұҲҳҴҵҶҷҸҹҺһҼҽҾҿ04C0ӀӁӂӃӄӅӆӇӈӉӊӋӌӍӎӏ04D0ӐӑӒӓӔӕӖӗӘәӚӛӜӝӞӟӠӡӢӣӤӥӦӧӨөӪӫӬӭӮӯ04F0ӰӱӲӳӴӵӶӷӸӹӺӻӼӽӾӿ

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2 Comments

This regex loses every other word when I try it, only odd words are going into the array, even words are lost.
Don't use it with split, use it with match. This matches a string not a position to split.

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