preg_quote
(PHP 4, PHP 5)
preg_quote — Quote regular expression characters
Description
$str
[, string $delimiter = NULL
] )
preg_quote() takes str
and puts a backslash in front of every character that is part of
the regular expression syntax. This is useful if you have a
run-time string that you need to match in some text and the
string may contain special regex characters.
The special regular expression characters are: . \ + * ? [ ^ ] $ ( ) { } = ! < > | : -
Parameters
-
str -
The input string.
-
delimiter -
If the optional
delimiteris specified, it will also be escaped. This is useful for escaping the delimiter that is required by the PCRE functions. The / is the most commonly used delimiter.
Return Values
Returns the quoted string.
Changelog
| Version | Description |
|---|---|
| 5.3.0 | The - character is now quoted |
Examples
Example #1 preg_quote() example
<?php
$keywords = '$40 for a g3/400';
$keywords = preg_quote($keywords, '/');
echo $keywords; // returns \$40 for a g3\/400
?>
Example #2 Italicizing a word within some text
<?php
// In this example, preg_quote($word) is used to keep the
// asterisks from having special meaning to the regular
// expression.
$textbody = "This book is *very* difficult to find.";
$word = "*very*";
$textbody = preg_replace ("/" . preg_quote($word) . "/",
"<i>" . $word . "</i>",
$textbody);
?>
Notes
Note: This function is binary-safe.
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