Preg_replace isn't removing span tags properly

Hi everyone,

I can't seem to get preg_replace to remove the contents and tags of span tags in a document. Here is my replace code. The document source ($text) is retrieved through curl.

$text8 = preg_replace('/class=".*?"/ims',"", $text);
$text7 = preg_replace('/style=".*?"/ims',"", $text8);
$text6 = preg_replace('/id=".*?"/ims',"", $text7);
$str = preg_replace("/<span.*?<\/span>/ims","", $text6);

echo $str;

PHP:

Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

Thanks!

 

you will need to escape the special chars using backslash for it to work properly.

 

Escape special characters , I always use % instead of backslashes in case there are some in the string .. , as % is rarely used

 

Remove the contents including the span tags ?

$str = preg_replace('#<span[^>]*>(.*)</span>#isU','', $str);

PHP:

 

Thanks @MyVodaPhone; that worked! +1 Rep to all who helped!