Reformatting phone number string from user input

Hi :)

I've been working on reformatting a phone number string from user input via
a form field. Ultimately, my goal is to format all phone numbers in the same
way regardless of whether a user inputs '(123) 456-7890', '123-456-7890',
'123.456.7890', etc. before I insert them into a db.

I know I've got a ways to go, but so far, after trying a few things I found
in the manual, I'm going in this direction...

$patterns[0] = "/\(/";
$patterns[1] = "/\)/";
$patterns[2] = "/-/";

$replacements[0] = "";
$replacements[1] = "";
$replacements[2] = " ";

$phone = preg_replace($patterns, $replacements, $phone);

This will change '(123) 456-7890' to '123 456 7890' which is what I am
after. I'm just wondering if there is a better or more elegant way to handle
this before I start trying to cover all the bases?

Note: I found a variety of examples in the mailing list archives, but none
of them seem to use the method above. Hmmm, does that mean I'm taking the
long way around ;) I know I could just copy some examples from there, but
I'm trying to use this as a learning opportunity and there seems to be more
than one way to skin the cat (no offence to cat lovers ;)

TIA for any advice,
Verdon

Verdon vaillancourt wrote:

> Hi :)
>
> I've been working on reformatting a phone number string from user input via
> a form field. Ultimately, my goal is to format all phone numbers in the same
> way regardless of whether a user inputs '(123) 456-7890', '123-456-7890',
> '123.456.7890', etc. before I insert them into a db.
>
> I know I've got a ways to go, but so far, after trying a few things I found
> in the manual, I'm going in this direction...
>
> $patterns[0] = "/\(/";
> $patterns[1] = "/\)/";
> $patterns[2] = "/-/";
>
> $replacements[0] = "";
> $replacements[1] = "";
> $replacements[2] = " ";
>
> $phone = preg_replace($patterns, $replacements, $phone);
>
> This will change '(123) 456-7890' to '123 456 7890' which is what I am
> after. I'm just wondering if there is a better or more elegant way to handle
> this before I start trying to cover all the bases?

Could do something like this:

$phone = preg_replace('/[^0-9]/','',$phone);
if(strlen($phone) != 10)
{ echo "phone number is not valid!"; }
$phone = substr($phone,0,3) . ' ' . substr($phone,3,3) . ' ' .
substr($phone,-4);

Which should cover all of the bases. :)

--
---John Holmes...

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