[SOLVED] Find q string in a URL

[The Little Guy]

I need to find text between:

 

q= and an & from a url passed to a variable. but... sometimes there is no ampersand, because the q= is at the end of the URL, so How can I find the q string?

 

if(preg_match("~q=(.+?)&~",$ref,$matches)){
$search = $matches[1];
}

 

my code receives this string as ONE string NOT multiple GET variables

[DarkWater]

<?php
$ref = "someurl.php?foobar=lol&q=ROFL";
preg_match('/q=(.+?)(?:&|$)/i', $ref, $matches);
print_r($matches);

[The Little Guy]

works!

[effigy]

~(?<=q=)[^&]*~