Preg_match for pattern matching in PHP - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Preg_match for pattern matching

📖 Scenario: You are building a simple PHP script to check if a user's input contains a specific word. This is useful for filtering or validating text inputs in web forms.

🎯 Goal: Build a PHP script that uses preg_match to find if the word "hello" appears in a given string.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create a variable called text with the exact string "Say hello to the world".

Create a variable called pattern with the exact regex pattern "/hello/".

Use preg_match with $pattern and $text to check for a match and store the result in $matchFound.

Print "Match found!" if $matchFound is true, otherwise print "No match found.".

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

Pattern matching is used in web forms to validate user input, like checking if an email or phone number is correct.

💼 Career

Knowing how to use <code>preg_match</code> helps in backend web development and data validation tasks.

1

Create the text variable

Create a variable called $text and set it to the string "Say hello to the world".

PHP

# Create the variable $text with the exact string
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use $text = "Say hello to the world"; to create the variable.

2

Create the regex pattern variable

Create a variable called $pattern and set it to the regex pattern "/hello/".

PHP

<?php
$text = "Say hello to the world";
# Create the variable $pattern with the regex pattern "/hello/"
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use $pattern = "/hello/"; to create the regex pattern variable.

3

Use preg_match to check for the pattern

Use preg_match with $pattern and $text to check for a match and store the result in a variable called $matchFound.

PHP

<?php
$text = "Say hello to the world";
$pattern = "/hello/";
# Use preg_match with $pattern and $text, store result in $matchFound
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use $matchFound = preg_match($pattern, $text); to check for the pattern.

4

Print the result

Write an if statement that prints "Match found!" if $matchFound is true, otherwise print "No match found.".

PHP

<?php
$text = "Say hello to the world";
$pattern = "/hello/";
$matchFound = preg_match($pattern, $text);
# Print "Match found!" if $matchFound is true, else print "No match found."
# Your code here

Need a hint?

Use if ($matchFound) { print("Match found!"); } else { print("No match found."); } to print the result.