How to validate URL in php?

Question

How do I validate a php URL? Example: I need the user to type a url, e.g., google.com.

However I need the url to be in the format: www.google.com and if it type any format other than this returns an error for it to fix.

If it types specific pages as well. Example www.google.com/images. I need it to validate only until . br or . with etc...only up to the domain. How do I do?

Answer 1

I solved my problem, guys, http://php.net/manual/en/function.parse-url.php.

Example:

$url = parse_url('http://facebook.com.br/imagens');
unset($url['host']); 
unset($url['scheme']);
if (count($url)) //url inválida