PHP preg_match正则表达式，用于查找字符串中的日期

Question

I try to make system that can detect date in some string, here is the code :

$string = "02/04/16   10:08:42";
$pattern = "/\<(0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01])\/\.- \/\.- \d{2}\>/";
$found = preg_match($pattern, $string);
            if ($found) {
                echo ('The pattern matches the string');
            } else {
                echo ('No match');
            }

The result i found is "No Match", i don't think that i used correct regex for the pattern. Can somebody tell me what i must to do to fix this code

Answer 1

First of all, remove all gibberish from the pattern. This is the part you'll need to work on:

(/0?[1-9]|[12][0-9]|3[01]/)

(As you said, you need the date only, not the datetime).

The main problem with the pattern, that you are using the logical OR operators (|) at the delimiters. If the delimiters are slashes, then you need to replace the tube characters with escaped slashes (/). Note that you need to escape them, because the parser will not take them as control characters. Like this: \/.

Now, you need to solve some logical tasks here, to match the numbers correctly and you're good to go. (I'm not gonna solve the homework for you :) )

These articles will help you to solve the problem tough:

• Character classes
• Repetition opetors
• Special characters
• Pipe character (alternation operator)

Good luck!