How To Parse A Variable

I have a variable that has something like:

datetime_system=>2010-10-14 02:07:07{~-SePaRaT0R-~}username_system=>test (16){~-SePaRaT0R-~}ip_system=>79.354.76.127

All I want is $userid = 16.  How do I go about this?[/code]

That looks very close to an array.  Is that one string in a variable or what?

$text = 'datetime_system=>2010-10-14 02:07:07{~-SePaRaT0R-~}username_system=>test (16){~-SePaRaT0R-~}ip_system=>79.354.76.127';
preg_match('~.*username_system=>.* \(([0-9]+)\).*~i', $text, $matches);

echo $matches[1];

Should do what you are looking for.

That looks very close to an array.  Is that one string in a variable or what?

Yes it is very close to an array.  How can I convert it to an array and then parse out the different values?

well if you have control over what the format of $text is and you need it to be a string, I would suggest you serialize the data (array) into a string for $text and then unserialize $text when you need it, which will restore it to the original array. 

If you do not have access to change the format of the $text string, assuming the format is regular (looks like what you have up there, but all the time), you could explode at the delimiter loop through and explode at => for the key => value pairs, basically simulating unserialize().  Though you may run into issues if values happen to be your delimiter or => as well...

Otherwise the safest way to do it would probably be to do what premiso suggested.