What is the php regular expression to get everything before a certain character?

[zerugaze]

For instance, I have the following string:

 

table:column

 

I need to get "table" as the result of the php regular expression.

 

So, I need everything before the ":" symbol

 

After that regular expression is performed, I would also like to get everything after the ":" symbol, or "column" as well.

 

 

[Zane]

you could just explode by colon

 

list($table, $column) = explode(":","table:column");
echo $table;
echo $column;

[sasa]

if(!(strpos($string, $symbol)===false)){
  $before = substr($string, 0, strpos($string, $symbol));
  $after = substr($string, strpos($string, $symbol)+1);
}