Replacing dumb quotes for smart quotes with preg_replace

Question

I\'m trying to swap dumb quotes for their smart equivalent. So I want to turn Jane said \'How do we do this?\' \'I don\'t know\' replied Sam. into Jane said ‘

Answer 1

$singlequotesPattern = "/'(.*?)'/";

Add a ? to make the * quantifier non-greedy. A greedy quantifier finds the longest match possible. A non-greedy one finds the shortest.

Greedy:

Jane said 'How do we do this?' 'I don’t know' replied Sam.
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Non-greedy:

Jane said 'How do we do this?' 'I don’t know' replied Sam.
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^   ^^^^^^^^^^^^