Question

I have some HTML content and I would like to replace a tag:

<span class='c1'>MY TEXT</span>

And keep MY TEXT.
I tried with:

$result = preg_replace('/(<span class=\'c1\'>)(.*)(<\/span>)/', '$2', $my_string);

But the closed tag still remains?
Can you help me and EXPLAIN where is my mistake? I would like to improve myself!
Thank you

Answer 1

Try using a lazy match (.*?) instead of a greedy match (.*).

Greedy match means it will match as much as possible before finishing, so if you have another </span> somewhere, it will match that instead. For example:

Using a greedy match:

<span class='c1'>MY TEXT</span><span class='c1'>MY OTHER TEXT</span>
                 ^--greedy match will go from here to here--^

Using a lazy match:

<span class='c1'>MY TEXT</span><span class='c1'>MY OTHER TEXT</span>
                 ^-lazy^                        ^---lazy----^