reading files

[varyaner]

Hi there,

I'm new to PHP. My question is the following. I wrote a script where the user needs to enter a string into a form, then the script reads from a txt file and compares it to what the user has written. the problem is, that it doesn't work properly, since, i assume, when there is more than one line in the text file, there is an invisible "code" added when reading the first line. i guess, that sounds weird, can't explain it any better. here's the script:
<?
$file=fopen(&quot;textfile.txt&quot;,&quot;r&quot;
$string=fgets($file,1000);
fclose($file);
if ($string==$e_string) echo ok;
else echo bad;
?>

e_sting is the string the user entered.

in textfile.txt there would be something like:
hello
world

 

[skiflyer]

Assuming your text file is fairly small, I wouldn't bother with the fopen, gets, fclose commands. I would just use the file command, to read each line of the file into an array.

the invisible character you're referring to is likely a line break or a newline character.

something similar to this...

<?php
  $found = false;
  $lines = file(&quot;textfile.txt&quot;);
  foreach ($lines as $line) {
    str_replace(&quot;\n&quot;, &quot;&quot;, $line);
    str_replace(&quot;\r&quot;, &quot;&quot;, $line);
    if ($string == $line) {
      $found = true;
    }
  }
  if ($found) {
    echo &quot;good&quot;;
  } else {
    echo &quot;bad&quot;;
  }
?>

There are places to neaten that up, specifically the replacing of the newlines, but I figured this illustrates each step the most clearly.

Enjoy,
Rob

 

[jamesp0tter]

even if the text file has 1 single line, it attaches a \n no the end. so if u have multiple lines and possible matches, u'll have to make a loop, smthing like:

<?
$file=fopen(&quot;textfile.txt&quot;,&quot;r&quot;
$string=fgets($file,1000);
fclose($file);

$possible = explode(&quot;\n&quot;, $string); // separate possible ones in an array
$i = 0; // start checking in the beginning of the array

while ($i <= count($possible)-1) { // -1 because all text files store an empty line in the end
if ($possible[$i] == $e_string) { $found = 1; break; }
}

if ($found == 1) { echo &quot;ok&quot;; } else { echo &quot;bad&quot;; }
?>

think that'll do it

 

[varyaner]

thx guys

 

[varyaner]

@ jamesp0tter, what exactly does explode() do?

 

[varyaner]

hmm, it still doesn't work...

 

[skiflyer]

which one still doesn't work? and how're you testing it?



if you're testing mine it's because I have a rather large oversight...

    str_replace("\n", "", $line);
    str_replace("\r", "", $line);
should read
    $line = str_replace("\n", "", $line);
    $line = str_replace("\r", "", $line);

and explode turns a string into an array, creating a new element every time it hits the specified character... as described here...

http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.explode.php

-Rob

 

[varyaner]

ok, thanx rob, i found annother way anyways, if I use
chop($string), it works