Why doesn't this PHP regular expression extract the url from the css value?

Question

I want to extract the url from the background css property "url('/img/hw (11).jpg') no-repeat". I tried:

$re     = '/url\(([\'\"]?.*\.[png|jpg|jpeg|gif][\'\"]?)\)/i';
$text   = "url('/img/hw (11).jpg')";
preg_match_all($re, $text, $matches);
print_r($matches);

and it gives me :

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
        )

    [1] => Array
        (
        )

)

What are you trying to extract from that string? The image URL? — hakre
– hakre, Commented Oct 6, 2011 at 16:21
Not checking for the extension, but as file extensions do not have to say anything in URLs: sscanf($text, 'url(%*[\'"]%[^\'"]', $url); — hakre
– hakre, Commented Oct 6, 2011 at 16:27

Alfred Fazio · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-06 16:27:37Z

3

Here is the correct regex. The ".*" in the middle of your regex is too greedy. Also, try replacing the square brackets with paranthesis. Also note that since you are using single quotes around the string that you do not need to escape the double quotes.

$re     = '/url\(([\'"]?.[^\'"]*\.(png|jpg|jpeg|gif)[\'"]?)\)/i';

answered Oct 6, 2011 at 16:27

Alfred Fazio

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Jeff Day · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-06 16:23:38Z

3

Try:

/url\(([\'\"]?.*\.(png|jpg|jpeg|gif)[\'\"]?)\)/i

Instead. The square brackets do a character-by-character comparison rather than the or comparison you're looking for.

answered Oct 6, 2011 at 16:23

Jeff Day

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DuoSRX · Accepted Answer · 2011-10-06 16:24:47Z

1

I think the probably lies in this part [png|jpg|jpeg|gif]. It's supposed to match only single characters.
You should do this instead :

/url\([\'\"]?(.*\.(jpg|png|jpeg|gif)[\'\"]?)\)/

answered Oct 6, 2011 at 16:24

DuoSRX

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