"ieure at php dot net", your idea is pure poetry!
The function below will standardize the capitalization on people's names and the titles of reports and essays . You may need to adapt the lists in "$all_uppercase" and "$all_lowercase" to suit the data that you are working with.
function my_ucwords($str, $is_name=false) {
// exceptions to standard case conversion
if ($is_name) {
$all_uppercase = '';
$all_lowercase = 'De La|De Las|Der|Van De|Van Der|Vit De|Von|Or|And';
} else {
// addresses, essay titles ... and anything else
$all_uppercase = 'Po|Rr|Se|Sw|Ne|Nw';
$all_lowercase = 'A|And|As|By|In|Of|Or|To';
}
$prefixes = 'Mc';
$suffixes = "'S";
// captialize all first letters
$str = preg_replace('/\\b(\\w)/e', 'strtoupper("$1")', strtolower(trim($str)));
if ($all_uppercase) {
// capitalize acronymns and initialisms e.g. PHP
$str = preg_replace("/\\b($all_uppercase)\\b/e", 'strtoupper("$1")', $str);
}
if ($all_lowercase) {
// decapitalize short words e.g. and
if ($is_name) {
// all occurences will be changed to lowercase
$str = preg_replace("/\\b($all_lowercase)\\b/e", 'strtolower("$1")', $str);
} else {
// first and last word will not be changed to lower case (i.e. titles)
$str = preg_replace("/(?<=\\W)($all_lowercase)(?=\\W)/e", 'strtolower("$1")', $str);
}
}
if ($prefixes) {
// capitalize letter after certain name prefixes e.g 'Mc'
$str = preg_replace("/\\b($prefixes)(\\w)/e", '"$1".strtoupper("$2")', $str);
}
if ($suffixes) {
// decapitalize certain word suffixes e.g. 's
$str = preg_replace("/(\\w)($suffixes)\\b/e", '"$1".strtolower("$2")', $str);
}
return $str;
}
// A name example
print my_ucwords("MARIE-LOU VAN DER PLANCK-ST.JOHN", true);
// Output: Marie-Lou van der Planc-St.John
// A title example
print my_ucwords("to be or not to be");
// Output: "To Be or Not to Be"
