Seach substring in string with a regex, get value and then replace it

Question

i have a string like this:

"bla blabla bla bla [bla:bla:bla] blabla blablabla [ble:ble:ble] bla bla bla"

What i need is to find if theres a "[*:*:*]" in my string and get the content. From that i think i know how to replace it.

For a better explanation, the string is a description of something, and between the "[]" theres some parameteres to build an url, so there can be any number of "[]" in my string and i need the content as this the info needed to build the url.

Thanks in advance!

You need only if there are [*:*:*] what if there are more than two i.e [*:*:*:*:*] — Code Maniac
– Code Maniac, Commented Jul 23, 2019 at 17:20
I got the [(.*?)] (actually i got the "/[[^]]*]/") but the problem is that regex will capture things like [text] that i dont want. The match has to be with the format [::*]. There are always 3 substrings in that. — mps
– mps, Commented Jul 23, 2019 at 17:26

The fourth bird · Accepted Answer · 2019-07-23 17:48:19Z

2

You might use \G to assert the position at the end of the previous match and capture what is between : in a capturing group:

(?:\[|\G(?!\A))([^:\][]+)(?::|\])

(?: Non capturing group
- \[ Match [
- | Or
- \G(?!\A) Assert position at the end of previous match, not at the start
) Close non capturing group
( Capture group 1
- [^:\][]+ match 1+ times any char except the listed in the character class
) close group 1
(?::|\]) Match either : or ]

Regex demo

Or use preg_match_all and array_map to match the 3 substrings between [*:*:*] to get all the values:

$pattern = "/\[((?:[^:]+:){2}[^:]+)\]/";
$str = "bla blabla bla bla [bla:bla:bla] blabla blablabla [ble:ble:ble] bla bla bla";

preg_match_all($pattern, $str, $matches);

$result = array_map(function($x) {
    return explode(':', $x);
}, $matches[1]);

print_r($result);

Result

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
            [0] => bla
            [1] => bla
            [2] => bla
        )

    [1] => Array
        (
            [0] => ble
            [1] => ble
            [2] => ble
        )

)

edited Jul 23, 2019 at 17:48

answered Jul 23, 2019 at 17:26

The fourth bird

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1 Comment

The fourth bird Over a year ago

I think preg_replace_callback is used for search and replacing but I think the OP wants the parts between to build a url that is why I chose preg_match_all. If you pass a string to preg_replace_callback, then a string is also returned and then you still have to get the separate parts.

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