PHP preg_match_all regex for deviding a string

Question

Can anybody help with completing my regex?

I strings which are formatted like this:

<FC012D>{p:19}Ja?<BF093C> Du möchtest<BC>zur Königin?<BC><BF040027><BF07>{p:20}<F8012D>Hmm...<BF093C><BC>Du bist gekommen um den<BC>Titel Kriegerin<BC>zu erhalten?<BD><BC>Verstehe.<BF093C> Das ist ganz<BC>schön tapfer für so<BC>eine junge Dame.<BD><BC>Die Königin wird sicher<BC>auch sehr<BC>überrascht sein.<BD><BC>{t:19}Bitte sehr,<BC>geh direkt hinein.<BD><FF>{t:20}Treibe Dich hier nicht<BC>herum, wenn Du hier<BC>nichts zu suchen hast!<BD><FF>

I need to split them into an array with preg_match_all to get 3 types of array-elements:

Strings with <>
Strings with {}
Anything else between the other two options as separate elements.

Here's what I have so far:

preg_match_all("/<[^>]*>|{(.*?)}|(\(.*?)\)/", $input_lines, $output_array);

I need some help with the last option, capturing strings in between. http://www.phpliveregex.com/p/kdW

Do you need <> and {} in the results? What is the expected output? Also, do you need to keep empty items in the resulting array? — Wiktor Stribiżew
– Wiktor Stribiżew, Commented May 26, 2017 at 9:30
@WiktorStribiżew Yes, I need them in the results, have a look at phpliveregex.com/p/kdW -the only thing missing there is the text between the <> and {} matches. Thank You! — Alex
– Alex, Commented May 26, 2017 at 9:41

Wiktor Stribiżew · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-26 09:43:31Z

3

Use preg_split with PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE | PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY flags and the following regex:

'~(<[^<>]*>|{[^{}]*})~'

See the regex demo. It matches and captures into Group 1 two types of substrings:

<[^<>]*> - < followed with 0+ chars other than < and > and then >
{[^{}]*} - { followed with 0+ chars other than { and } and then }

The PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE will include all matches into the resulting array. The PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY will remove unnecessary empty elements.

See the PHP demo:

$s = '<FC012D>{p:19}Ja?<BF093C> Du möchtest<BC>zur Königin?<BC><BF040027><BF07>{p:20}<F8012D>Hmm...<BF093C><BC>Du bist gekommen um den<BC>Titel Kriegerin<BC>zu erhalten?<BD><BC>Verstehe.<BF093C> Das ist ganz<BC>schön tapfer für so<BC>eine junge Dame.<BD><BC>Die Königin wird sicher<BC>auch sehr<BC>überrascht sein.<BD><BC>{t:19}Bitte sehr,<BC>geh direkt hinein.<BD><FF>{t:20}Treibe Dich hier nicht<BC>herum, wenn Du hier<BC>nichts zu suchen hast!<BD><FF>';
$res = preg_split('~(<[^<>]*>|{[^{}]*})~', $s, -1, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE | PREG_SPLIT_NO_EMPTY);
print_r($res);

answered May 26, 2017 at 9:43

Wiktor Stribiżew

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4 Comments

Wiktor Stribiżew Over a year ago

If you need to also match (...) substrings, just add an alternative - '~(<[^<>]*>|{[^{}]*}|\([^()]*\))~'

Alex Over a year ago

That's great! Thank you very much @wiktor. I can 100% work with that. I wish you a great weekend!

Sahil Gulati Over a year ago

@WiktorStribiżew Now i got to know what you were trying to say... sorry my bad.. perfect answer, today i have learnt PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE, +1 for you.

mickmackusa Over a year ago

Dang it, I had family time... I was going to experiment with these flags for this question! Well done @WiktorStribiżew as always.

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