Character Replacement

[W0nkey]

I am taking a string and trying to convert it into a url friendly version. In short, I need spaces changed to "_" and only letters and numbers. e.g "Special's Menu Today?" -> "Specials_Menu_Today.html"

I can use str_replace for some parts or make an array of valid/invalid characters, but I'd like to hear suggestions on how to do this 'nicely'. Is there a built in function that can do this easily?

Thanks.

 

[W0nkey]

I should have mentioned, I think ereg or preg look like the way to achieve this, but I'm a bit stuck on writing the regular expression ...

 

[ingresman]

You could set up a loop around the string and check each character e.g.

for each char in string as ic
if ic==" " then ic = "_";
if ic between (a..z) then oc=ic;
if ic between (0..9) then oc=ic;
if ic between (A..Z) then oc=ic;
next

or something like that, you might convert the character to its character code and test that (remember a-z is a dense set in ascii).
The implementation is left as an excersize for the reader !

 

[KarveR]

rudely plaigiarised(sic) from PHP.net

<?php
$string = "Special's Menu Today?";

$patterns[0] = "/'/";
$patterns[1] = "/ /";
$patterns[2] = "/?/";

$replacements[0] = "";
$replacements[1] = "_";
$replacements[2] = "";

echo preg_replace($patterns, $replacements, $string);
?>

______________________________________________________________________
There's no present like the time, they say. - Henry's Cat.

 

[cLFlaVA]

I suggest looking into the urlencode function.

The php definition is:
string urlencode ( string str)

so, you could do:
$urlfriendly = urlencode($noturlfriendly)

This function will replace any space or symbol with the url version (ie: space becomes %20, etc.)

Not sure if this is what you're looking for, but check it out.

*cLFlaVA
----------------------------
A polar bear walks into a bar and says, "Can I have a ... beer?"
The bartender asks, "What's with the big pause?