PHP Regex cannot match

Question

I have a huge text file that contains some data that I want to insert in my database. The problem is that I don't want to insert every data, and I can't seem to make any preg_match_all(), in fact I'm a little newbie with regular expressions:

file.txt

[03-07-2010 09:03:23] : [180.20.106.107] : [/success]:
        [SEND] invite ->    helen, 
        [SEND] uname -> test, 
        [SEND] fname -> test, 

[03-07-2010 09:04:28] : [180.20.106.107] : [/success]:
        [SEND] invite ->    helen3, 
        [SEND] uname -> test3, 
        [SEND] fname -> test3, 
        [SEND] register ->  register, 

[03-07-2010 09:07:43] : [180.20.106.107] : [/success]:
        [SEND] invite ->    register, 
        [SEND] uname -> helen2, 
        [SEND] fname -> none, 

[03-07-2010 09:09:48] : [180.20.106.107] : [/success]:
        [SEND] invite ->    helen2, 
        [SEND] uname -> test2, 
        [SEND] fname -> test2, 

[03-07-2010 10:14:18] : [180.20.106.107] : [/success]:
        [SEND] invite ->    register, 
        [SEND] uname -> mickey, 
        [SEND] fname -> test8, 
        [SEND] register ->  register,

I want to extract only the block that has register, that means from the start [03-07-2010 09:04:28] till the end register -> register, and [03-07-2010 10:14:18] to the end of that block (register -> register).

I have tried a lot of things, but like I said, I'm a newbie in regex

This does not work:

#\[(.*)\] : \[(.*)\] : \[\/success\]:(.*)register ->    register#s

Extract only a single block that has register? Or extract the blocks that contain register? What's your expected output? — hwnd
– hwnd, Commented Oct 24, 2013 at 23:16

Niet the Dark Absol · Accepted Answer · 2013-10-26 13:34:21Z

There's a few places where you should use ungreedy quantifiers, but that's not the problem.

The issue is that you are trying to get data on another line. . does not match newlines unless you specifically tell it to with the s modifier.

That being said, you can't do this with a single regexp, because it will match the first line that has the timestamp and IP, then skip all the way to the register -> register line and say "oh hey it works!"

Instead, I suggest splitting your subject string into indiviudal blocks, like so:

$blocks = preg_split("/\r?\n\s*\r?\n/",$inputText);
foreach($blocks as $block) {
    list($first,$data) = explode("\n",$block,2);
    if( preg_match("/\bregister\s*->\s*register\b/",$data)) {
        preg_match_all("/\[(.*?)\]/",$first,$m,PREG_SET_ORDER);
        list($timestamp,$ip) = $m[0];
        // do something here with the information.
    }
}

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