$re = '/(?<!href="|">)(https?:\/\/[\w\-\.!~?&=+\*\'(),\/]+)((?!\<\/\a\>).)*/m';
$str = 'Test,
Here\\\'s an interesting in-house litigation position with JPMorgan Chase in New York I thought you might be interested inL
<a href="http://www.xxx.com/lcdetail.php?akey=e1725">http://www.xxx.com/lcdetail.php?akey=e1725</a>
They are not using recruiters to fill this job, so if you are interested you can just apply directly.
http://www.xxx.com/lcdetail.php?akey=e1725
Cordially
--Harrison';
$subst = "<a href=\"$1\">$1</a>";
$result = preg_replace($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