I’m going to post a few php tricks here and there for my audience (if there’s any) to have fun with.
Trick 1 : Triple Equal “===”
Usage : if($a===$b)
Reason : === is used to make like easier for the (advanced) php programmer. It forces a comparison within the same type thus eliminating some programming checking codes.
$input = 1; if($input == true) { echo "input is not boolean true but it passed anyway!"; } if($input === true) { echo "input needs to be boolean true to pass this if statement"; } //What's so useful? if($_GET[something]===0) { echo "My form recieved exactly a 0, not a blank, not a false... but a 0!"; }elseif(!$_GET[something]) { echo "could be a null,blank or false"; }
Trick 2 : echo comma
Usage : echo $a,$b,$c,$d;
Reason : Less memory usage, less cpu cycles, faster output to screen and… bragging rights.
$a = "hel"; $b = "lo"; $c = " wor"; $d = "ld"; echo $a.$b.$c.$d; //What actually happens is that the string is buffered (added) together // before sending to output // $a .=$b adds "hel"+"lo" // $a .=$c adds "hello"+" wor" // $a .=$d adds "hello wor"+"ld" // echo $a echos out "hello world" echo $a,$b,$c,$d; //What actually happens is that the string is not added but sent directly to output // echo $a => echos out "hel" // echo $b => echos out "lo" // echo $c => echos out " wor" // echo $d => echos out "ld"
That’s all for this week… till i have time to blog again… cheers
Another use of “!==” would be to end arrays which have blank “” or 0.
ie :
$arraytest = (0,””,”testing”,”\0″);
//add to array to end it
$arraytest[] = false;
for($i=0;$arraytest[$i]!==false;$i++)
{
echo “ARRAY $i : “.$arraytest[$i];
}