How to check if a string can be used as a variable name in PHP?

Question

In PHP one can use variable variables...

For example...

class obj { }
$fieldName = \"Surname\";
$object = new obj();
$object->Name = \"John\";
$objec         


        

Answer 1

Validating with RegEx if you wanted to allow $ or &$ (pass variable by reference) to be validated in the string, you could use this regex:

/^([\$]|(&\$))[a-zA-Z_\x7f-\xff][a-zA-Z0-9_\x7f-\xff]*/