downloads | documentation | faq | getting help | mailing lists | reporting bugs | php.net sites | links | my php.net 
search for in the  

<preg_quotepreg_replace>
Last updated: Thu, 26 Jun 2008

preg_replace_callback

(PHP 4 >= 4.0.5, PHP 5)

preg_replace_callback — Perform a regular expression search and replace using a callback

Description

mixed preg_replace_callback ( mixed $pattern , callback $callback , mixed $subject [, int $limit [, int &$count ]] )

The behavior of this function is almost identical to preg_replace(), except for the fact that instead of replacement parameter, one should specify a callback .

Parameters

pattern

The pattern to search for. It can be either a string or an array with strings.

callback

A callback that will be called and passed an array of matched elements in the subject string. The callback should return the replacement string.

You'll often need the callback function for a preg_replace_callback() in just one place. In this case you can use create_function() to declare an anonymous function as callback within the call to preg_replace_callback(). By doing it this way you have all information for the call in one place and do not clutter the function namespace with a callback function's name not used anywhere else.

Example #1 preg_replace_callback() and create_function()

<?php
/* a unix-style command line filter to convert uppercase
 * letters at the beginning of paragraphs to lowercase */
$fp = fopen("php://stdin", "r") or die("can't read stdin");
while (!
feof($fp)) {
  
$line = fgets($fp);
  
$line = preg_replace_callback(
      
'|<p>\s*\w|',
      
create_function(
          
// single quotes are essential here,
           // or alternative escape all $ as \$
          
'$matches',
          
'return strtolower($matches[0]);'
      
),
      
$line
  
);
   echo
$line;
}
fclose($fp);
?>

subject

The string or an array with strings to search and replace.

limit

The maximum possible replacements for each pattern in each subject string. Defaults to -1 (no limit).

count

If specified, this variable will be filled with the number of replacements done.

Return Values

preg_replace_callback() returns an array if the subject parameter is an array, or a string otherwise.

If matches are found, the new subject will be returned, otherwise subject will be returned unchanged.

ChangeLog

Version Description
5.1.0 The count parameter was added

Examples

Example #2 preg_replace_callback() example

<?php
// this text was used in 2002
// we want to get this up to date for 2003
$text = "April fools day is 04/01/2002\n";
$text.= "Last christmas was 12/24/2001\n";
// the callback function
function next_year($matches)
{
 
// as usual: $matches[0] is the complete match
  // $matches[1] the match for the first subpattern
  // enclosed in '(...)' and so on
 
return $matches[1].($matches[2]+1);
}
echo
preg_replace_callback(
          
"|(\d{2}/\d{2}/)(\d{4})|",
          
"next_year",
          
$text);

?>

The above example will output:

April fools day is 04/01/2003
Last christmas was 12/24/2002

Example #3 preg_replace_callback() using recursive structure to handle encapsulated BB code

<?php
$input
= "plain [indent] deep [indent] deeper [/indent] deep [/indent] plain";

function
parseTagsRecursive($input)
{

  
$regex = '#\[indent]((?:[^[]|\[(?!/?indent])|(?R))+)\[/indent]#';

   if (
is_array($input)) {
      
$input = '<div style="margin-left: 10px">'.$input[1].'</div>';
   }

   return
preg_replace_callback($regex, 'parseTagsRecursive', $input);
}

$output = parseTagsRecursive($input);

echo
$output;
?>

See Also



add a noteadd a note User Contributed Notes
Perform a regular expression search and replace using a callback
There are no user contributed notes for this page.




<preg_quotepreg_replace>
Last updated: Thu, 26 Jun 2008
show source | credits | sitemap | contact | advertising | mirror sites
Copyright © 2001-2005 The PHP Group
All rights reserved.
This unofficial mirror is operated at: http://phpbuilder.com/
Last updated: Tue Nov 1 20:20:59 2005 EST
Columns / Articles | Tips / Quickies | News | News Linking and RSS Feeds | Shared Code Library
Mail Archives | Support / Discussion Forums | Get Started! Links | Contribute! | Docs