Find array within a string?

Question

I have a column in the database that saves a free text, and together is saved some data within [ ] is to find only what is inside [ ] in this string to convert it to an array.

Example:

$texto = "Hoje fomos até São Paulo visitar o paciente, [236,AD-BF] e não foi possível chegar a um diagnóstico";

I would like to extract only the [236,AD-BF] and turn it into array.

There’s some way to do it?

$array = explode(',',$texto);

Answer 1

Capture what is inside [ and ] is simple to do with a regex like:

\[(.*)\]

Explanation:

\[   - Apanhar o caratere literal [
(.*) - Capturar tudo o que vem a seguir
\]   - Até encontrar o caratere literal ]

See in regex101

This gives you the text inside [ and ]. With this text just use explode with "," to get the desired array.

Example:

$texto = "Hoje fomos até São Paulo visitar o paciente, [236,AD-BF] e não foi possível chegar a um diagnóstico";
preg_match("/\[(.*)\]/", $texto, $capturado);

$array = explode(",", $capturado[1]);
print_r($array);

Watch it run on Ideone

For capture with regex I used function preg_match, returning the first capture group in position 1, that explains the parameter $capturado[1].