determine if one or more strings are contained within a single variable

Hi using the example below, how would I modify the code if the $needle was a list instead of a single string?

Ie I want to establish if any one of the items from a list are contained within the $haystack as opposed to just one single string. Say there where 3 $needles,
$needle = ‘other’
$needle = ‘the’
$needle = ‘moth’

thank you for any help

 

If $needle is an array, simply walk through the array using strpos(), i.e.
<?php
$needles=array("Moe","Larry","Curly","Shemp","Joe","Curly Joe");
foreach ($needles as $needle) {
$pos=strpos($haystack,$needle);
if($pos) print "Yahoo!\n";
}

 

Loop through the needles

 

If you don't mind a little overhead in your script, I like this approach:

$needles = array ('one', 'two', 'three');
$needles_regex = '![' . explode('|', $needles) . ']!';
if (preg_match($needles_regex, $haystack, $matches))
{
// one or more needles were found
}

PHP:

 

Until you're $needles contain something like |, [, ], (, ) or / and break your RegEx...

(I assume you meant to use implode rather than explode...)

 

yea..

also, if your string is multiline, you'll need some Perl modifier for the pattern, which i don't remember exactly.

anyway, its an idea, not a solution..

 

thanks all for your help, still a novice at PHP ... after all these years. Modified the code to do exactly what I wanted with your advice.

Can track my warehouse traffic now : )