Are there alternative methods or libraries in PHP that can be used to highlight search terms in database output more efficiently than str_replace, str_ireplace, or preg_replace?

Highlighting search terms in database output can be done more efficiently using the `preg_replace` function with a regular expression pattern to match the search terms. This method allows for case-insensitive matching and more flexibility in highlighting the search terms in the output. By using regular expressions, we can target specific search terms and apply the highlighting style more efficiently. 

$search_terms = $_GET['search']; // Assuming search terms are passed through GET parameter
$output = "Database output containing search terms";
$highlighted_output = preg_replace('/(' . implode('|', explode(' ', $search_terms)) . ')/i', '<span style="background-color: yellow">$1</span>', $output);
echo $highlighted_output;

Keywords

PHP highlighting search terms database output efficiency

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