Regex - how to match until something

[veg_all]

How do you replace an occurence until a certain point: You can see my
example code below and the output:
$string1 = 'Hello world today';
$string2 = 'Hello blahblah';

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello.*(?!today)/', 'Hello ***' , $string1
);
$string2 = preg_replace ( '/Hello.*(?!today)/', 'Hello ***' , $string2
);

echo "$string1 - This should be Hello *** today\n";
echo "$string2 - This is correct\n";

Outputs:
======
Hello *** - This should be Hello *** today
Hello *** - This is correct

[Rik]

ve*****@yahoo.com wrote:

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello.*(?!today)/', 'Hello ***' , $string1 $string1 = 'Hello world today';

'Hello world today' isn't followed by "today", so it returns true,

Read up on regexes.

Learn what (.*?) means.

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello(.*?)( today)/', 'Hello ***\2' , $string1);

Grtz,
--
Rik Wasmus

[Mladen Gogala]

On Sat, 29 Apr 2006 13:46:31 -0700, veg_all wrote:

How do you replace an occurence until a certain point: You can see my
example code below and the output:

Would something like this:

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello.*(today)/', 'Hello *** $1' , $string1);

be what you're looking for?
--
http://www.mgogala.com

[Mladen Gogala]

On Sun, 30 Apr 2006 02:55:54 +0200, Rik wrote:

Read up on regexes.

Learn what (.*?) means.

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello(.*?)( today)/', 'Hello ***\2' , $string1);

Grtz,

Actually, there is no need to put (.*) within the parenthesis as you are
not using it later. You are just creating another variable needlessly. In
addition to that, $2 is preferred to \2. The "backslash" variables are
only needed in the original string, not in the replacement. Also, no need
to use non-hungry version of .* as there is only one terminator ("today")
in the string. Invocation like

$string1 = preg_replace ( '/Hello.*(today)/', 'Hello *** $1' ,$string1);

would be a bit faster and use less memory.

--
http://www.mgogala.com