Re: REGEX? SQL? Getting only so much from a long field

John: You can try the following (I have never used them, but...): 1. Get the position of the first <BR> using strpos(): $pos = strpos($longstory,"<BR>"); 2. Extract the first part using substr(): $preview = substr($longstory,1,$pos-1); 3. Show the preview: echo $preview; You can check these functions in the PHP manual under String Functions. I hope this helps. Saludos, Pablo Vera _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ Monday, October 16, 2000, 2:38:21 PM, John wrote: AJ> Hello all, AJ> I've got some long stories in a news database. I want to make a little AJ> "preview" type function that only spits out the first paragraph and then AJ> says "read the rest"... what I can't figure out is how to have it just AJ> read the field up to the first <br> tag. (all of the stories have these AJ> added when the story is put into the database. Any suggestions? AJ> John AJ> --------------------- AJ> John Asendorf - jasendorf@lcounty.com AJ> Web Applications Developer AJ> http://www.lcounty.com - NEW FEATURES ADDED DAILY! AJ> Licking County, Ohio, USA AJ> 740-349-3631