Need some help wth EREG statement please. 2 month problem.

[sbroad]

I really need to use EREG or something that is also compatible with MySql. I would like to have the same search done in PHP and MySQL.

$test="
<NEXT>STORE_AS:::COMPANY\n
<NEXT>STORE_AS_DATA:::ACME INC\n
<NEXT>COMPANY_NAME:::ACME INC\n
<NEXT>COMPANY_DEPT:::SEVICE\n
<NEXT>NAME_LAST:::USER\n
<NEXT>NAME_FIRST:::TEST\n
<NEXT>NAME_INIT:::W\n
";

Let's say we had above statement with no tabs actually in data.
I would like to only search on a specific parts on the entire variable.

So, I would like to search on anything that is between ::: and \n thorughout the variable on each line..

So if I wanted to find service I would type 'S' in a search string and S I would find. Or Search for 'VICE' or 'ST' for TEST.

But if a user wanted to search for 'EX' the ereg should not report back true because I do not want <NEXT><DATA>::: to be searched.

Statements I have tried were like this

Example Query For "ST"

ereg("<NEXT>.:::.ST.*\n")

This does not work, but maybe you can get an idea of my problem. Their maybe white space before the \n also. So the search would probably need something like that as well.

[sbroad]

<NEXT>NEXT DAY:::sounds like tuesday\n
<NEXT>PREV DAY:::sounds like monday\n
<NEXT>COLD DAY:::sounds like sunday\n

ereg("<NEXT>[[:alnum:]]*:::s",$postedContactInfoString);

This works if the Letter 's' for example is next to the colons. But what if the search was further to the right of the colons.

Say I wanted to find 'ues'. This is the ultimate problem. I need to search deeper but I do not want the search to pick up data from the left of the colons.