php how can i replace a character then the very next charact

Hi all. I am trying to remove a character and then the very next character from a string but the following character is never the same character.

Here is what i meen

I have a series of strings like this



$output = "^2 bob"
$output ="^t jim"
$output ="^y tom"
$output ="^4 fred"

No i know i can use

str_replace("^","",$output);

will give me

2 bob
t jim
y tom
4 fred

and this will replace the ^ in all of them one after the other

I want

bob
jim
tom
fred

how do i write it so i can replace the ^ and then the very next character ?

any help would be great!

Why not just use substr?

If I go strictly by your description, I would use this, which will remove the carrot and the following character no matter what it is.



If I assume you only want this to apply if the carrot is actually followed by another character that isn't a space, I would use this.



If I assume you want that space between them removed too, I would use this.



If I can assume that these will always be at the very beginning of the string, I would use this.

sweet thanks much!!

I got it working using a different method but this looks like it will work better