is it possible to modify part of a text field output?

tomboy78

I am made a simple web site search function. I use MySql 4 and have a table that contains all text on a web site in a column type text.

I can search it, but I want to make the search term bold when I print out the text field content.

select page_data from table1 where page_data like '%$search_term%'; 

while($row=mysql_fetch_array($result))   { 
        $data = $row['page_data']; 
        print $data; 
}

$ data now contains all the text on that web site which has a referance to the search term.

Is there a way to say something like:
if $search_term is located in $data make it bold?

future thanks
tom

Pig

$data = str_replace($search_term, "<b>$search_term</b>", $data);

tomboy78

Thanks Pig. That works.

However, when I search for oracle for example, It will not bold Oracle. And I see that str_ireplace would fix that problem, but ireplace is only available in php 5.

Is it another way to get case-INsensitive replace in php 4?

FoTo50

I'm not that good with regular expressions, but wouldnt eregi_replace() do it's job in this case as well?

goa103

Originally posted by tomboy78
Thanks Pig. That works.

However, when I search for oracle for example, It will not bold Oracle. And I see that str_ireplace would fix that problem, but ireplace is only available in php 5.

Is it another way to get case-INsensitive replace in php 4?

The solution is to use preg_replace, don't forget to quote your regular expression pattern ! Check out the example from the PHP Manual :

Example 2. Italicizing a word within some text

// In this example, preg_quote($word) is used to keep the
// asterisks from having special meaning to the regular
// expression.

$textbody = "This book is *very* difficult to find.";
$word = "*very*";
$textbody = preg_replace ("/".preg_quote($word)."/",
                          "<i>".$word."</i>",
                          $textbody);

Pig

preg_replace is better if you are not matching exactly. It is slower than str_replace, but sounds like a better fit for your needs.

goa103

Sorry I forgot, you also need to use the "i" modifier. It means "insensitive case" :

$new_string = preg_replace ("/" . preg_quote ($old_string) . "/i", ...);

stolzyboy

here is an example from php.net

<?
function stri_replace($find,$replace,$string)
{
        if(!is_array($find)) $find = array($find);
        if(!is_array($replace))
        {
                if(!is_array($find)) $replace = array($replace);
                else
                {
                        // this will duplicate the string into an array the size of $find
                        $c = count($find);
                        $rString = $replace;
                        unset($replace);
                        for ($i = 0; $i < $c; $i++)
                        {
                                $replace[$i] = $rString;
                        }
                }
        }
        foreach($find as $fKey => $fItem)
        {
                $between = explode(strtolower($fItem),strtolower($string));
                $pos = 0;
                foreach($between as $bKey => $bItem)
                {
                        $between[$bKey] = substr($string,$pos,strlen($bItem));
                        $pos += strlen($bItem) + strlen($fItem);
                }
                $string = implode($replace[$fKey],$between);
        }
        return($string);
}

For example:
<?
$foobar = 'FoO FOO foo bAr BAR bar';
echo stri_replace(array('foo','bar'),'woggle',$foobar);

// echos 'woggle woggle woggle woggle woggle woggle'
?>

tomboy78

thanks for good ideas. my search function is getting there now