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preg_replace_callback_array

(PHP 7, PHP 8)

preg_replace_callback_arrayPerform a regular expression search and replace using callbacks

Description

preg_replace_callback_array(
    array $pattern,
    string|array $subject,
    int $limit = -1,
    int &$count = null,
    int $flags = 0
): string|array|null

The behavior of this function is similar to preg_replace_callback(), except that callbacks are executed on a per-pattern basis.

Parameters

pattern

An associative array mapping patterns (keys) to callables (values).

subject

The string or an array with strings to search and replace.

limit

The maximum possible replacements for each pattern in each subject string. Defaults to -1 (no limit).

count

If specified, this variable will be filled with the number of replacements done.

flags

flags can be a combination of the PREG_OFFSET_CAPTURE and PREG_UNMATCHED_AS_NULL flags, which influence the format of the matches array. See the description in preg_match() for more details.

Return Values

preg_replace_callback_array() returns an array if the subject parameter is an array, or a string otherwise. On errors the return value is null

If matches are found, the new subject will be returned, otherwise subject will be returned unchanged.

Errors/Exceptions

If the regex pattern passed does not compile to a valid regex, an E_WARNING is emitted.

Changelog

Version Description
7.4.0 The flags parameter was added.

Examples

Example #1 preg_replace_callback_array() example

<?php
$subject
= 'Aaaaaa Bbb';

preg_replace_callback_array(
[
'~[a]+~i' => function ($match) {
echo
strlen($match[0]), ' matches for "a" found', PHP_EOL;
},
'~[b]+~i' => function ($match) {
echo
strlen($match[0]), ' matches for "b" found', PHP_EOL;
}
],
$subject
);
?>

The above example will output:

6 matches for "a" found
3 matches for "b" found

See Also

add a note

User Contributed Notes 4 notes

up
10
Sz.
6 years ago
Based on some tests, I found these important traits of the function. (These would
be nice to see documented as part of its spec, e.g. for confirmation. Without that,
this is just experimental curiosity. Still better than guesswork, though! ;) )

1. Changes cascade over a subject across callbacks, i.e. a change made to a
subject by a callback will be seen by the next callback, if its pattern matches
the changed subject.
(But a change made by a previous call of the *same* callback (on any subject)
will not be seen by that callback again.)

2. The pattern + callback pairs will be applied in the order of their appearance
in $patterns_and_callbacks.

3. The callback can't be null (or '') for a quick shortcut for empty replacements.

4. Overall, the algorithm starts iterating over $patterns_and_callbacks, and then
feeds each $subject to the current callback, repeatedly for every single match
of its pattern on the current subject (unlike "preg_match_all", that is, which
can do the same in one go, returning the accumulated results in an array).

This basically means that the "crown jewel", an even more efficient function:
"preg_replace_all_callback_array" is still missing from the collection.

(Of course, that would better fit a new design of the regex API, where one
API could flexibly handle various different modes via some $flags = [] array.)

5. (This last one is not specific to this function, but inherent to regexes, OTOH,
it's probably more relevant here than anywhere else in PHP's regex support.)

Even apparently simple cases can generate a crazy (and difficult-to-predict)
number of matches, and therefore callback invokations, so remember the set
$limit, where affordable. But, of course, try to sharpen your patterns first!

E.g. use ^...$ anchoring to avoid unintended extra calls on matching substrings
of a subject, (I.e. '/.*/', without anchoring, would match twice: once for the
whole subject, and then for a trailing empty substring -- but I'm not quite sure
this should actually be correct behavior, though.)
up
9
drevilkuko at gmail dot com
8 years ago
finally!!!

before (<=php5.6):

<?php
$htmlString
= preg_replace_callback(
'/(href="?)(\S+)("?)/i',
function (&
$matches) {
return
$matches[1] . urldecode($matches[2]) . $matches[3];
},
$htmlString
);

$htmlString = preg_replace_callback(
'/(href="?\S+)(%24)(\S+)?"?/i', // %24 = $
function (&$matches) {
return
urldecode($matches[1] . '$' . $matches[3]);
},
$htmlString
);
?>

php7

<?php

$htmlString
= preg_replace_callback_array(
[
'/(href="?)(\S+)("?)/i' => function (&$matches) {
return
$matches[1] . urldecode($matches[2]) . $matches[3];
},
'/(href="?\S+)(%24)(\S+)?"?/i' => function (&$matches) {
return
urldecode($matches[1] . '$' . $matches[3]);
}
],
$htmlString
);
?>
up
1
claus at tondering dot dk
4 months ago
Note that the first replacement is applied to the whole string before the next replacement is applied.

For example:

<?php
$subject
= 'a b a b a b';

preg_replace_callback_array(
[
'/a/' => function ($match) {
echo
'"a" found', PHP_EOL;
},
'/b/' => function ($match) {
echo
'"b" found', PHP_EOL;
}
],
$subject
);

?>

will print

"a" found
"a" found
"a" found
"b" found
"b" found
"b" found

This means that you cannot use global variables to communicate information between the functions about what point in the string you have reached.
up
-3
jfcherng at NOSPAM dot gmail dot com
8 years ago
Here's a possible alternative in older PHP.

<?php

// if (!function_exists('preg_replace_callback_array')) {

function preg_replace_callback_array (array $patterns_and_callbacks, $subject, $limit=-1, &$count=NULL) {
$count = 0;
foreach (
$patterns_and_callbacks as $pattern => &$callback) {
$subject = preg_replace_callback($pattern, $callback, $subject, $limit, $partial_count);
$count += $partial_count;
}
return
preg_last_error() == PREG_NO_ERROR ? $subject : NULL;
}

// }

?>
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