remove all non a-z & A-Z from a string

[Anon]

How do I remove all non a-z & A-Z from a string?

[Anon]

Well lets see here. What you want done will require the use of regular expression matching, and there are two regular expression functions that you can use... ereg_replace() and preg_replace() If are a Perl developer like me, you should use the latter (the latter was introduced late in PHP3). Here's what you can do with ereg_replace()...

<?php //PHP regular expression replacing...
$stringOfText = "300 elephants are not equal to 100"; //The string of text
$newString = ereg_replace("[^[:alpha:]]", "", $stringOfText);
?>

AND here is what you can do with preg_replace()

<?php //Perl regular expression replacing...
$stringOfText = "300 elephants are not equal to 100"; //The string of text
$newString = preg_replace("/\W|\d/", "", $stringOfText);
?>

both of these examples take the string "300 elephants are not equal to 100" and change it to "elephantsarenotequalto".

---

I know, O LORD, that a man's life is not his own; it is not for man to direct his steps.
Jeremiah 10:23

[Anon]

cool, how do I also get the blanks?

[Anon]

Oh, you want to keep the spaces? Then use the following code:

Using the older ereg_replace():

<?php //PHP regular expression replacing...
$stringOfText = "300 elephants are not equal to 100"; //The string of text
$newString = trim(ereg_replace("[^[:alpha:] \f\r\t\n]", "", $stringOfText));
?>

AND here is what you can do with preg_replace():

<?php //Perl regular expression replacing...
$stringOfText = "300 elephants are\\n\t not equal to 100"; //The string of text
$newString = trim(preg_replace("/[^A-Za-z \f\r\t\n]/", "", $stringOfText));
?>

And there you go!

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Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
This is what the ancients were commended for.
By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.
--Hebrews 11:1-3