search for string in text file using PHP

Question

I'm trying to search for a phrase inside a .txt file using preg_match but it never gives me matches. Strange thing is if I try copying and pasting the file content in a sandbox I get good matches. This is what I tried:

$txtUrl='https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1411579/000110465920131796/0001104659-20-131796.txt';
$getTextS3 = file_get_contents($txtUrl, true);
$str=strip_tags($getTextS3);
 $re = '/Shares of Class A common stock/i';
  preg_match_all($re, $str, $match);
  var_dump($match);

Can you give us a sample of the text you're serching on?

El_Vanja
– El_Vanja

2021-01-28 12:08:53 +00:00
Commented Jan 28, 2021 at 12:08 — El_Vanja
– El_Vanja, Commented Jan 28, 2021 at 12:08

ykahveci · Accepted Answer · 2021-01-28 12:16:55Z

1

You cannot find anything because there is an escaped non-breaking-space ( ) between "Shares of Class" and "A common stock". You would have to include this non-breaking space in your regex. I would advice you to write echo($str); before you execute the regex (the line with preg_match_all) to look at the string as a debugging step.

Before you search through a string like this, you should analyze it carefully.

answered Jan 28, 2021 at 12:16

ykahveci

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1 Comment

Germanmb75 Over a year ago

added str_replace("\xc2\xa0", ' ',$str) and solved. thx

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