title: Regex word boundary alternative
body: <p>I was using the standard <code>\b</code> word boundary. However, it doesn't quite deal with the dot (.) character the way I want it to.</p>
  
  <p>So the following regex:</p>
  
  <p><code>\b(\w+)\b</code></p>
  
  <p>will match <code>cats</code> and <code>dogs</code> in <code>cats.dog</code> if I have a string that says <code>cats and dogs don't make cats.dogs</code>.</p>
  
  <p>I need a word boundary alternative that will match a whole word only if:</p>
  
  <ol>
  <li>it does not contain the dot(.) character</li>
  <li>it is encapsulated by at least one space( ) character on each side</li>
  </ol>
  
  <p>Any ideas?!</p>
  
  <p>P.S. I need this for PHP</p>