Calculating the Similarity Between Two Strings - PHP

Thestrspn()function returns the length of the first segment in a string containing characters also found in another string. Its prototype follows:

int strspn(string str1, string str2)

Here’s how you might usestrspn()to ensure that a password does not consist solely of numbers:

<?php
    $password = "3312345";
    if (strspn($password, "1234567890") == strlen($password))
        echo "The password cannot consist solely of numbers!";
?>

In this case, the error message is returned because$passworddoes indeed consist solely of digits.

Calculating the Difference Between Two Strings

Thestrcspn()function returns the length of the first segment of a string containing characters not found in another string. Its prototype follows:

int strcspn(string str1, string str2)

Here’s an example of password validation usingstrcspn():

<?php
    $password = "a12345";
    if (strcspn($password, "1234567890") == 0) {
        echo "Password cannot consist solely of numbers!";
    }
?>

In this case, the error message will not be displayed because$passworddoes not consist solely of numbers.

Manipulating String Case

Four functions are available to aid you in manipulating the case of characters in a string: strtolower(), strtoupper(), ucfirst(), and ucwords(). These functions are discussed in this section.

Converting a String to All Lowercase

Thestrtolower()function converts a string to all lowercase letters, returning the modified string. Nonalphabetical characters are not affected. Its prototype follows:

string strtolower(string str)

The following example usesstrtolower()to convert a URL to all lowercase letters:

<?php
    $url = http://WWW.EXAMPLE.COM/;
    echo strtolower($url);
?>

This returns the following:

--------------------------------------------
http://www.example.com/
--------------------------------------------

Converting a String to All Uppercase

Just as you can convert a string to lowercase, you can convert it to uppercase. This is accomplished with the functionstrtoupper(). Its prototype follows:

string strtoupper(string str)

Nonalphabetical characters are not affected. This example usesstrtoupper()to convert a string to all uppercase letters:

<?php
    $msg = "I annoy people by capitalizing e-mail text.";
    echo strtoupper($msg);
?>

This returns the following:

--------------------------------------------
I ANNOY PEOPLE BY CAPITALIZING E-MAIL TEXT.
--------------------------------------------

Capitalizing the First Letter of a String

Theucfirst()function capitalizes the first letter of the stringstr, if it is alphabetical. Its prototype follows:

string ucfirst(string str)

Nonalphabetical characters will not be affected. Additionally, any capitalized characters found in the string will be left untouched. Consider this example:

<?php
    $sentence = "the newest version of PHP was released today!";
    echo ucfirst($sentence);
?>

This returns the following:

--------------------------------------------
The newest version of PHP was released today!
--------------------------------------------

Note that while the first letter is indeed capitalized, the capitalized word PHP was left untouched.

Capitalizing Each Word in a String

Theucwords()function capitalizes the first letter of each word in a string. Its prototype follows:

string ucwords(string str)

Nonalphabetical characters are not affected. This example usesucwords()to capitalize each word in a string:

<?php
    $title = "O'Malley wins the heavyweight championship!";
    echo ucwords($title);
?>

This returns the following:

--------------------------------------------
O'Malley Wins The Heavyweight Championship!
--------------------------------------------

Note that if O’Malley was accidentally written as O’malley,ucwords()would not catch the error, as it considers a word to be defined as a string of characters separated from other entities in the string by a blank space on each side.

Please check back next week for the continuation of this article.