[php] Function ereg_replace() is deprecated - How to clear this bug?

I have written following PHP code:

$input="menu=1&type=0&";

print $input."<hr>".ereg_replace('/&/', ':::', $input);

After running above code, it gives following warning,

Deprecated: Function ereg_replace() is deprecated

How can I resolve this warning.

Here is more information regarding replacing ereg_replace with preg_replace

http://php.net/ereg_replace says:

Note: As of PHP 5.3.0, the regex extension is deprecated in favor of the PCRE extension.

Thus, preg_replace is in every way better choice. Note there are some differences in pattern syntax though.

change the call to ereg_replace to use preg_replace instead

IIRC they suggest using the preg_ functions instead (in this case, preg_replace).

print $input."<hr>".ereg_replace('/&/', ':::', $input);

becomes

print $input."<hr>".preg_replace('/&/', ':::', $input);

More example :

$mytext = ereg_replace('[^A-Za-z0-9_]', '', $mytext );

is changed to

$mytext = preg_replace('/[^A-Za-z0-9_]/', '', $mytext );