preg_split() Regex for Initials Lastname

Question

I have a name pattern looking like this:

F. O. O. Bar
F. Oobar
F. O. Obar

I'm currently trying to develop a regex that lets me split names in firstname, maybe initials and surname according to one of these.

foreach($authors as $author) {
    $arr = preg_split("/([a-zA-Z]. )+/", $author, -1, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE);
    //Do stuff with $arr
}

However, this also splits Foo. Bar (or to be exact o.). The problem is that I cannot limit it to lowercase only, as the data I have incoming are VERY inconsistent, so I cannot rely on this.

I just noticed you're using `preg_split` but you want to match? What *do* you really want? — Tim Pietzcker, Sep 18 '12 at 10:38
@TimPietzcker match was the wrong choice of words, I do want to split actually. I have a list of names, and I need to split them in order to store them in a database that needs seperate entries for firstname(Initials) and surname. — sonOfRa, Sep 18 '12 at 10:47

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 18 '12 at 10:38

3

The . has to be escaped.

$arr = preg_split("/([a-zA-Z]\. )+/", $author, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE);

answered Sep 18 '12 at 10:38

wroniasty

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Thanks for that too, that caused an error I did not notice as well. – sonOfRa Sep 18 '12 at 10:49

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 18 '12 at 10:37

1

You mean you only want to allow one letter before the dot? Use a word boundary to ensure this:

$arr = preg_split("/\b([a-zA-Z]\. )+/", $author, PREG_SPLIT_DELIM_CAPTURE);

Also, as wroniasty correctly noted, the dot needs escaping.

answered Sep 18 '12 at 10:37

Tim Pietzcker

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preg_split() Regex for Initials Lastname

2 Answers2