shorten url

[zebdaag]

hi i want to shorten some urls that i take from my database i got this script but it doesn't work:

        <?
        $text = "http://www.uni-regensburg.de/Fakultaeten/philFakII/Psychologie/PsyII/beautycheck/english/index.htm";
        $chars = 25;

        $niew = $text." ";
        $niew = substr($niew,0,$chars);
        $niew = substr($niew,0,strrpos($niew,' '));
        $niew = $niew."...";

        echo $niew;
        ?>

this outputs only the ...

how to solve this??
thanks in advance!

Greetz Joost

[so_is_this]

How about this?

$url = "http://www.uni-regensburg.de/Fakultaeten/philFakII/Psychologie/PsyII/beautycheck/english/index.htm";
echo preg_replace('\/(\w+\/)+', '/.../', $url); 

[bokeh]

echo preg_replace('/\/(\w+\/)+/', '/.../', $url); 

I think I'd write that a bit differently just in case there are any non-word characters in the string.

echo preg_replace('|(?!</)/([^/]+/)+|', '/.../', $url); 

[so_is_this]

Yours replaces incorrectly (with those | in there)
or replaces too much (without them).
Without those | in yours, I get this:

http://.../index.htm

With mine, I get this:

http://www.uni-regensburg.de/.../index.htm

[bokeh]

Yours replaces incorrectly

It was a typo in the expression. I didn't test it. Should have been:

echo preg_replace('|(?<!/)/([^/]+/)+|', '/.../', $url);

[so_is_this]

What are the vertical bars on both ends supposed to do in your suggestion? My understand is that those are supposed to be like "or" operators (alternative branch) -- meaning there should be a pattern on both sides of them. Perhaps you can teach me something by telling me how they are supposed to work in your suggestion. Because you're suggestion is still not working for me.