Question

I’m trying to explode a string like this:

([a:b:c:d:...])

I have a code that partially works

([^\(\[\]\):])+

but it’s not ideal since I need to make sure the string found is within the ([ ]) tags. But whenever I add them to the regexp, it stops working (can’t find any matches).

\(\[([^\(\[\]\):])+\]\)

What am I doing wrong?
I’m using this website to test them regular expressions

http://myregextester.com/index.php

Thank you in advance.

Answer 1

I would do it in two parts, first match the stuff between the brackets

\(\[([^)\]]*)\]\)

which will put the inner contents in to matches[1], then simply explode/split on :