Question

I have the following code, which I need to tweak, in order to get the desired echo.

<?php

$price = "A1,500.99B";

$pattern = '/([\d,]+\.)(\d+)(.*)$/';   // This is something that I need to change, in order to get the desired result

$formatted_1 = preg_replace($pattern, '$1', $price);
$formatted_2 = preg_replace($pattern, '$2', $price);
$formatted_3 = preg_replace($pattern, '$3', $price);
$formatted_4 = preg_replace($pattern, '$4', $price);

echo $formatted_1;   // Should give A
echo $formatted_2;   // Should give 1,500
echo $formatted_3;   // Should give 99
echo $formatted_4;   // Should give B

?>

I know that I should add another ( ) with something inside, within the $pattern, as well as tweak the above $pattern, but I have no idea what to do.

Thanks.

Answer 1

Any particular reason to use preg_replace if you just want a match?

This pattern will match your price:

/([a-zA-Z])([\d,]+)\.(\d+)([a-zA-Z])/

If you then write this PHP:

$price = "A1,500.99B";
//Match any letter followed by at least one decimal digit or comma 
//followed by a dot followed by a number of digits followed by a letter
$pattern = '/([a-zA-Z])([\d,]+)\.(\d+)([a-zA-Z])/';
preg_match($pattern,$price,$match);

$formatted_1 = $match[1];
//etc...

You will have the four matches. Obviously you need to add your own exception handling.