ereg_replace -->REG_BADRPT warning

[tmcp]

Hello I'm a bit new to regular expressions and I'm having a problem

I'm trying to strip any code which is inside a <p> tag for instance from
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNorma l">
to
<p>

I'm using the following line where $tmpString is the string of html pasted from word.

$tmpString = ereg_replace("< p.*?>", "<p>", $tmpString);

when I use this code I get the error
<b>Warning</b>: ereg_replace(): REG_BADRPT

I've used http://regexlib.com/RETester.aspx tool to see if the <p.*?> is working properly and it seems to be.

I tried replacing it with
preg_replace("< p.*?>", "<p>", $tmpString);
but this didn't work either it seems just replace every "p" with <p>

Any help much appreaciated.

[sujithfem]

Hi I have found the solution , the issue due to special character esp for this warning REG_BADRPT error , use backslashing before any special chars in your pattern string.

For example:


$source = eregi_replace(" \*", "", $invar)