Another regex: square brackets

Question

I have something like: word[val1|val2|val3] . Need a regex to capture both: word and val1|val2|val3

Another sample: leader[77] Result: Need a regex to capture both: leader and 77

This is what I have so far: ^(.*\[)(.*) and it gives me: array[0]=word[val1|val2|val3];

array[1]=word[

array[2]=val1|val2|val3]

---

array[1] is needed but without [

array[2] is needed but without ]

Any ideas? - Thank you

Answer 1

You can use

([^][]+)\[([^][]*)]

Here is the regex demo

Explanation:

• ([^][]+) - Group 1 matching one or more chars other than ] and [
• \[ - a literal [
• ([^][]*) - Group 2 capturing 0+ chars other than [ and ]
• ] - a literal ].

See IDEONE demo:

$re = '~([^][]+)\[([^][]*)]~'; 
$str = "word[val1|val2|val3]"; 
preg_match($re, $str, $matches);
echo $matches[1]. "\n" . $matches[2];