Is it advisable to use regular expressions (REGEX) or sscanf for parsing data from a text file in PHP?

When parsing data from a text file in PHP, it is generally advisable to use regular expressions (REGEX) for more complex patterns or structures, as they offer more flexibility and power in matching specific patterns. However, for simpler and more straightforward parsing tasks, using the sscanf function can be a more efficient and easier-to-read option. 

// Using regular expressions (REGEX) for parsing data from a text file
$fileContents = file_get_contents('data.txt');
$pattern = '/(\d{2})-(\d{2})-(\d{4})/';
preg_match($pattern, $fileContents, $matches);
$date = $matches[3] . '-' . $matches[1] . '-' . $matches[2];
echo $date;

// Using sscanf for parsing data from a text file
$fileContents = file_get_contents('data.txt');
sscanf($fileContents, '%d-%d-%d', $day, $month, $year);
$date = $year . '-' . $month . '-' . $day;
echo $date;

Keywords

regular expressions REGEX sscanf parsing data text file

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