preg_replace inside preg_replace - is it possible?

White_Coffee

This may be a very simple question but I was unable to find the answer. There is a simple replacement:

$text = preg_replace("#\[title\](.*?)\[/title\]#si", "<span class=\"title\">\\1</span><a name=\"\\1\"></a>", $text);

The above code outputs:

<span class="title">Title One</span><a name="Title One"></a>

Now I want to remove space from the anchor so that it will be <a name="TitleOne">. To do so, I tried to use preg_replace inside preg_replace:

$text = preg_replace("#\[title\](.*?)\[/title\]#si", "<span class=\"title\">\\1</span><a name=\"" . preg_replace("/\s+/", "", "\\1") . "\"></a>", $text);

The problem is that it doesn't change anything and the space is still there. Could anyone be so kind and explain me what am I doing wrong? TIA.

drew010

probably better to use [man]preg_replace_callback[/man], or just use a second preg_replace after the first one, on a separate line.

White_Coffee

Sorry for being stupid - I'm a neiwbie - but I already looked at preg_replace_callback and don't understand how it can help...

drew010

in the callback function it will get the array of matches and replacements, so you can then return the data from there after performing additional modifications to it.