Problem with regular expressions for unicode

Can anybody say me why doesn't this work for unicode strings

preg_replace('/\b'.$word.'\b/ui', '<span class="bigger">$0</span>', $text);

Code (markup):

The variables $word and $text are unicode strings.

 

can you write the values of $word and $text

 

For example:

$word = имя;
$text = Мое имя Рубен;

It is unicode strings in Russian.

 

hmmm, firstly you need to convert your document to utf-8
or put this code between HEAD tags up in your page..

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=UTF-8">

HTML:

then try this sample:

$word = 'имя';
$text = 'Мое имя Рубен';
echo preg_replace('/'.$word.'/i', 'your replacement words', $text);

PHP:

Rep me up if that helps

 

My document is utf-8 and the meta tag is put.
And the code you have written is not what I want. I want to replace that words, which are not in other word-form. For example the word "body" must not be replaced in word "everybody".

 

just add spaces like:
echo preg_replace('/ '.$word.' /i', ' blah ', $text);

 

but it doesn't work for these
1. "$word"
2. $word,
3. $word.
...

 

you can add whatever you want to the pattern i.e:
preg_replace('/ '.$word.'(.|,| |)/i', ' blah ', $text);

 

And this doesn't work for this
$word = "word";
$text = "word word. word word, word";
Try and see that several "word"-s wouldn't be replaced!!!

The script that I have written in the first post works perfectly, but not for Unicode strings!!!

 

Try this:

If it doesn't work, try to use 'iconv' or 'mbstring' php extensions.

 

How use 'iconv' or 'mbstring' for my example?

 

Can anybody help me?? It is very important!!!