My first attempt just used str_replace, but I quickly realized that even dirty words embedded in clean words would get filtered. For example, words like “glass” would get filtered to “gl***”.

The solution? Regular expressions:

function str_replace_word($needle,$replacement,$haystack){
    $pattern = "/\b$needle\b/i";
    $haystack = preg_replace($pattern, $replacement, $haystack);
    return $haystack;
}


The pattern is pretty simple, but not being very familiar with regular expressions, I had to do a couple Google searches before I found what I needed.

Here’s a simple breakdown of the pattern string:

The pattern delimiter

The pattern string begins and ends with a forward slash / character. These two characters are called the pattern delimiter and are required by the preg_match function. They can actually be any non-alphanumeric and non-backslash character, so you can pick your pattern delimiters to help with readability.

$pattern = '/\bMatch me\b/';
$pattern = '@\bMatch me\b@';
$pattern = '#\bMatch me\b#';


If you don’t supply a pattern delimiter, PHP will spit out this warning:

Warning: preg_replace() [function.preg-replace]: Delimiter must not be alphanumeric or backslash in


The word boundary \b

The \b escape character acts as a word boundary. For a nice explanation of this metacharacter, take a look at Jan Goyvaerts’ excellent regular expression tutorial page.

The ‘i’ at the end

The ‘i’ at the end of the pattern string just tells preg_match that the search should be case insensitive.

Crags Castle National Park and Mount Shasta

Crater Lake National Park

Blizzon might as well be called WoWCon, and since I don’t play WoW, I had no idea what the panels were about. I spent a good amount of time just walking around, taking pictures and following the cosplay girls.

Take a look at the gallery.

Canyon Park in Monrovia, CA.

Starring Robert Redford, Meryl Streep and Tom Cruise.