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[Utility & Helpers](/categories/utility) 4. / 5. nimayneb/yawl ActiveLibrary[Utility & Helpers](/categories/utility) nimayneb/yawl ============= YAWL - Yet another wildcard library - Match pattern for strings with asterisk and query token 2.2.0(5y ago)291GPL-3.0PHPPHP ^7.4.0CI failing Since Sep 29Pushed 5y ago2 watchersCompare [ Source](https://github.com/nimayneb/yawl)[ Packagist](https://packagist.org/packages/nimayneb/yawl)[ RSS](/packages/nimayneb-yawl/feed)WikiDiscussions master Synced 2mo ago READMEChangelog (5)Dependencies (4)Versions (8)Used By (1) YAWL - Yet another wildcard library =================================== [](#yawl---yet-another-wildcard-library) [![Build Status](https://camo.githubusercontent.com/2f459e1580f2a1573e8f53231a6fe6fdcd8b666725060e260b7e646cf1f8dec4/68747470733a2f2f7472617669732d63692e6f72672f6e696d61796e65622f7961776c2e7376673f6272616e63683d6d6173746572)](https://travis-ci.org/nimayneb/yawl) This is a library with classes for any wildcard implementation that finds pattern with \* (asterisk) and ? (query) token. Problem ------- [](#problem) Without regular expression extension (named `ext-pcre` - before PHP 5.3) you have no wildcard support within PHP. See . The known wildcard behavior (see [Wildcard character (@Wikipedia)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildcard_character)) is limited for a good implementation. A small remedy? We need a kind of "compiled" and "cached" pattern. The implementation of regular expression like `preg_match` has a huge performance. We lost these advantage as of PHP 7.0, because of just-in-time compiled pcre pattern! Table of content ---------------- [](#table-of-content) 1. Benchmark 2. Wildcard variants 3. Possible valid pattern 4. Invalid pattern 5. Escaping 6. Repeating phrases 7. Caching 8. Wish list 9. Appendix API: 1. [Matcher (for use of single calls)](Documentation/WildcardMatcher.md) 2. [Performer (for use of multiple calls)](Documentation/WildcardPerformer.md) 3. [Converter (for use of regular expression)](Documentation/WildcardConverter.md) Benchmark --------- [](#benchmark) When we benchmark several methods to match a fitting phrase (1000 random strings), we have a good results without "regular expressions": *Single Byte:* BenchmarkTimeReferenceDifference`WildcardPerformer`0.00353789100 %-`preg_match`0.0122389871 %71 %`WildcardMatcher`0.0163528925 %78 %*Multi Byte (like Unicode):* BenchmarkTimeReferenceDifference`WildcardPerformer`0.00660086100 %-`mb_ereg_match`0.0129048848 %48 %`WildcardMatcher`0.0325250660 %79 %Internal PHP functions comparison --------------------------------- [](#internal-php-functions-comparison) FunctionWildcardMatcherWildcardPerformerstrlen95 (-4)substr54 (-1)strpos51 (-4)chr22 (0)Conditions5713 (-44)Wildcard variants ----------------- [](#wildcard-variants) != character== 1 character>= 2 charactersToken000(invalid)001??... / ??...\*010?011\*\*100(empty string)101??\*\* (draft)110?\*111\*Possible valid pattern ---------------------- [](#possible-valid-pattern) ``` ?? (2 characters) ???* (2-3 characters) ``` Invalid pattern --------------- [](#invalid-pattern) ``` *** ?** ?*? *? ``` Escaping -------- [](#escaping) ``` \\ \? \* ``` Please note of this escaping scenarios: SubjectPatternExplanation`search\\*``*\\*`matches `search\ ` with wildcard, then matches escaped `*``search\\*``*\\\\*`matches `search` with wildcard, then matches escaped `\ `, then matches `*` with wildcard`search\\*``*\\\\\\*`matches `search` with wildcard, then matches escaped `\ `, then matches escaped `*``search\\*``*\\\\\\\\*`matches `search` with wildcard, then matches escaped `\ `, then not matches escaped `\ ` - ignore rest of `*`Further explanation: programmaticinternalafter escaping`\\``\``\``\\\\``\\``\`Repeating phrases ----------------- [](#repeating-phrases) The asterisk (`*`) has a problem finding the right position. If several identical phrases can be found in a string, the search must take place in all positions to find the pattern. ``` Search: *is?ue (where is "*is") Subject: this is an asterisk issue Founds: ^ ^ ^ ^ ``` The simplest solution is to break down the pattern recursively, but it should be not recursively. Caching ------- [](#caching) The regular expression extension has a caching and compiling strategy to improve performance. The second time the same pattern is called, a tremendous increase in performance is achieved. To help us to improve also performance, we use a simple key-value caching. ``` protected array $cachedResults = []; public function match(string $subject): bool { return $this->cachedResults[$subject] ?? $this->cachedResults[$subject] = $this->computePhrases($subject, 0); } ``` This is not a preferred solution. Wish list --------- [](#wish-list) - Remove recursive call of `WildcardPerformer::computePhrases` (see [Wikipedia - Matching wildcards](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matching_wildcards)) - Remove of `StringFunctionMapper` (too slow) - Combine Matcher and Performer (two advantages in one) - Caching interface - New pattern `??**` (0 or 2 characters) or `?????**` (0 or 5 characters) - [Glob support](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glob_(programming)) - Example: `[abcdef0123456789]`, `[0-9a-f]`, `[!a-z]` - Use in YAWL: - `[0-9a-f]?` (one times) - `[0-9a-f]?*` (zero or one times) - `[0-9a-f]*` (zero or N times) - `[0-9a-f]**` (one or N times) - `[0-9a-f]x` (one times then follows `x`) Appendix -------- [](#appendix) Common Algorithms: - [Wildcard matching algorithms by "Alessandro Cantatore"](http://xoomer.virgilio.it/acantato/dev/wildcard/wildmatch.html) Non-recursive Algorithms: - [Matching Wildcards: An Improved Algorithm for Big Data by "Kirk J. Krauss"](http://developforperformance.com/MatchingWildcards_AnImprovedAlgorithmForBigData.html) Recursive Algorithms: - [Compares a filename or pathname to a pattern by "Apple"](https://opensource.apple.com/source/Libc/Libc-167/gen.subproj/fnmatch.c.auto.html) - [Stackoverflow - Recursive solutions for glob pattern matching by "Siler"](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/30823596/recursive-solutions-for-glob-pattern-matching) PDepend ------- [](#pdepend) [![Build Status](Resources/PDependPyramid.svg)](Resources/PDependPyramid.svg) - NOP - Number Of Packages - NOC - Number Of Classes - NOM - Number Of Methods - LOC – Lines of Code - CYCLO - Cyclomatic complexity - CALLS - number of distinct function- and method-calls - ANDC - Average Number of Derived Classes - AHH - Average Hierarchy Height ### Health Score 27 — LowBetter than 49% of packages Maintenance20 Infrequent updates — may be unmaintained Popularity7 Limited adoption so far Community12 Small or concentrated contributor base Maturity62 Established project with proven stability Bus Factor1 Top contributor holds 50% of commits — single point of failure How is this calculated?**Maintenance (25%)** — Last commit recency, latest release date, and issue-to-star ratio. Uses a 2-year decay window. **Popularity (30%)** — Total and monthly downloads, GitHub stars, and forks. Logarithmic scaling prevents top-heavy scores. **Community (15%)** — Contributors, dependents, forks, watchers, and maintainers. Measures real ecosystem engagement. **Maturity (30%)** — Project age, version count, PHP version support, and release stability. ### Release Activity Cadence Every ~45 days Recently: every ~56 days Total 6 Last Release 2187d ago Major Versions 1.1 → 2.0.02019-10-14 ### Community Maintainers ![](https://www.gravatar.com/avatar/0fbcb5c834ad511bbf12b303f38026f1c00466d4e2fe1e96f5bcfbae83779ac9?d=identicon)[nimayneb](/maintainers/nimayneb) --- Top Contributors [![dependabot-preview[bot]](https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/in/2141?v=4)](https://github.com/dependabot-preview[bot] "dependabot-preview[bot] (1 commits)")[![nimayneb](https://avatars.githubusercontent.com/u/9550921?v=4)](https://github.com/nimayneb "nimayneb (1 commits)") --- Tags stringtokenquerystringspatternMatchasteriskmatcherwildcardquestion markquestionmark ### Code Quality TestsPHPUnit ### Embed Badge ![Health badge](/badges/nimayneb-yawl/health.svg) ``` [![Health](https://phpackages.com/badges/nimayneb-yawl/health.svg)](https://phpackages.com/packages/nimayneb-yawl) ``` ### Alternatives [doctrine/inflector PHP Doctrine Inflector is a small library that can perform string manipulations with regard to upper/lowercase and singular/plural forms of words. 11.4k855.8M711](/packages/doctrine-inflector)[nette/utils 🛠 Nette Utils: lightweight utilities for string & array manipulation, image handling, safe JSON encoding/decoding, validation, slug or strong password generating etc. 2.1k394.3M1.5k](/packages/nette-utils)[league/uri-components URI components manipulation library 31932.3M66](/packages/league-uri-components)[opis/string Multibyte strings as objects 7120.9M7](/packages/opis-string)[delight-im/str Convenient object-oriented operations on strings 68336.2k2](/packages/delight-im-str)[ptrofimov/matchmaker Ultra-fresh PHP matching functions 27167.7k](/packages/ptrofimov-matchmaker) PHPackages © 2026 [Directory](/)[Categories](/categories)[Trending](/trending)[Changelog](/changelog)[Analyze](/analyze)