php
<?php
$tt1="b a b c";
echo substr_count($tt1,"a"or"b");
?>
Since the word has both a and b i want the result as three.I am trying to get the output as 3.But i am getting 0.please help
2 Answers
substr_count will just look for one substring.
- You can't let it search for two strings at once.
- If you really want to, the simplest option would be calling it twice. (See RiggsFollys´ answer.)
The shorter option would be using preg_match_all instead (returns the count):
$count = preg_match_all("/a|b/", $tt1);
(Which also just traverses the string once looking for alternatives. Easier to adapt for more substrings. May look for word \b boundaries etc. But only advisable if you've heard/read about regexps before.)
2 Comments
RiggsFolly
I would be interested to know what is quicker/more efficient. running a functions a few times or loading the regex engine? Any ideas?
mario
It's only worth profiling with a real example. String searches are the very domain of PCREs VM, and often quicker than PHPs VM doing loops and string comparisons. However that's only getting noticeable for longer input and alternatives there.
You could try
<?php
$tt1="b a b c";
echo substr_count($tt1,'a') + substr_count($tt1,'b');
?>
OR to add the possiblilty to have any number of characters counted
<?php
function substr_counter($haystack, array $needles)
{
$cnt = 0;
foreach ( $needles as $needle) {
$cnt += substr_count($haystack, $needle);
}
return $cnt;
}
$tt1="b a b c";
$total = substr_counter( $tt1, array('a', 'b') );
?>
"a" or "b"will just become a1there.