Best way to extract text within parenthesis - PHP parsing

Question

What's the best way to get text from a string. I have a LONGTEXT field in the db and currently is:

<ul>
 <li>Winner on Laps #153 LemonAid Racing (1996 Geo Metro, Davenport Iowa)</li>
 <li>Winner on Index of Effluency #42 J CrewD (1985 Jagaur XJ6, Knoxville Tn)     </li>
 <li>Winner, Class A (The Good) #153 LemonAid Racing (1996 Geo Metro, Davenport Iowa)</li>
 <li>Winner, Class B (The Bad) #128 Duff Beer (1994 Honda Civic, Raleigh NC and Atlanta GA)</li>
 <li>Winner, Class C (The Ugly) #64 Team Fairlylame (1964 Ford Fairlane, Savannah GA)</li>
 <li>Organizer's Choice #54 Knoxvegas Lowballers (1998 Ford Contour SVT, Knoxville TN)</li>
 <li>Most Heroic Fix #40 Mock Grass Racing (1998 Kia Sephia, Columbia SC)</li>
 <li>Judges' Choice #85 Apocalyptic Racing (1978 Toylet Celica, St Louis mo)     </li>
 <li>Judges' Choice #2 #17 Fireball Racing (1991 Ford Escort, Aurora IL)</li>
</ul>

1 Say I wanted to get the strings "1996 Geo Metro, Davenport Iowa", "1985 Jagaur XJ6, Knoxville Tn".. etc... from the entire string (the text inside the parenthesis).What is the best way to do so?

Say I wanted to get all the text in the 'li' up to the symbol "#", is that possible?

Thanks in advance

Try to use regex for this.

node_modules
– node_modules

2017-05-31 19:09:22 +00:00
Commented May 31, 2017 at 19:09 — node_modules
– node_modules, Commented May 31, 2017 at 19:09
use preg_match_all

Hamza Rashid
– Hamza Rashid

2017-05-31 19:12:25 +00:00
Commented May 31, 2017 at 19:12 — Hamza Rashid
– Hamza Rashid, Commented May 31, 2017 at 19:12

rafascar · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-31 20:09:12Z

3

You can try using Regular Expressions.

For example, to find (the text inside the parenthesis) you can use the following regex:

/(?<=\()([^\)]+)(?=\))/

and to get all the text in the 'li' up to the symbol "#" you can use:

/(?<=<li>).*(?=#)/

Perform a regular expression match on PHP

Awesome regex resource!

edited May 31, 2017 at 20:09

answered May 31, 2017 at 19:24

rafascar

3433 silver badges8 bronze badges

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

8 Comments

steffen Over a year ago

Why do you escape #? Shouldn't you start after <li>?

Ken Ryan Over a year ago

Going to give these a try! Thank you!

rafascar Over a year ago

No problem. If this answer helped you to solve your problem, mark it as accepted. Good luck! :) @KenRyan

Ken Ryan Over a year ago

hi @rafascar how could I get the "team name" from "Winner on Laps #153 LemonAid Racing (1996 Geo Metro, Davenport Iowa)." Basically I'd want "LemonAid Racing" from this part. Would it be the string after the first number and before the "("? thanks for your help again!

rafascar Over a year ago

To get only the texts between parentheses that follow the same pattern as (1996 Geo Metro, Davenport Iowa), for example, you can try this regex: (?<=$)([^$]+)[,]([^\)]+)(?=\))

|

Akin Williams · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-31 19:26:38Z

0

Use preg_match_all

preg_match_all('/$([^$]+)\)/', $content, $matches);
preg_match_all('/^[\s]*\<li\>([^#]+)#/m', $content, $matches);

$matches[1] will contain your captured text.

answered May 31, 2017 at 19:26

Akin Williams

6588 silver badges14 bronze badges

7 Comments

steffen Over a year ago

No need to put \s in [...].

Akin Williams Over a year ago

Are you sure ? Try using my regex to capture without it. :-)

steffen Over a year ago

Why would I, it's simply the same.

Akin Williams Over a year ago

Ummm, nope, not really. To elaborate, you can't tell from just looking at the question, but there is actually whitespace between the start of each line and the <li> tag.

steffen Over a year ago

Tried. It's the same.

|

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Best way to extract text within parenthesis - PHP parsing

2 Answers 2

8 Comments

7 Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

8 Comments

7 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related