$re = '/(?:\G(?!\A)|id:\s*\')[^\'\s]*\K\s(?=[^\']*\')/m';
$str = 'var user1 = {id: \'Alan Banks\'};
var user2 = {id: \'Chris Daily\'};
var user1 = {id: \'Alan Banks TEXT here\'};
var user2 = {id: \'Chris Daily More text\'};';
$subst = "_";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php