Sorry for the very basic question, but there's simply no easy way to search for a string like that nor here neither in Google or SymbolHound. Also haven't found an answer in PHP Manual (Pattern Syntax & preg_replace).
This code is inside a function that receives the $content and $length parameters.
What does that preg_replace serves for?
$the_string = preg_replace('#\s+#', ' ', $content);
$words = explode(' ', $the_string);
if( count($words) <= $length )
Also, would it be better to use str_word_count instead?