PHP - printing variables inside a string

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chevrolux

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#243543 17-Dec-2018 16:57

So just mucking around with a SMS sending page.

I do a SQL query to get the "message body"...

$smsSql = mysqli_query($conn, "SELECT * FROM `sms_msg` WHERE id='1'");
$smsData = mysqli_fetch_array($smsSql);

And then load the message itself in to a variable just to make it tidy for me going forward:

[code]$message = $smsData['msg'];[/code]

So if you were to echo $message it would print:

Hi $name, This is a test message. I have also sent an email to $email

So further up in the script I have already defined the $name, and $email variables. And when i send the message, I would like the values of $name & $email to be printed in that $message string.

To send the message I do this...

$result = $api->sendSms($message,$mobile);

Do I need to do a find/replace sort of thing? Or is there some kind of cool easy way with some special brackets/quotes/characters that will just magically re-write that message string for me.

I have no idea what to google, so am failing miserably.

TheoM

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#2146628 17-Dec-2018 17:27

tl;dr: variable inside string literal

from https://stackoverflow.com/a/5368897/3831621

Use:

$message = "Hi {$name}, This is a test message. I have also sent an email to {$email}"

-e- string must be "double quoted" not 'single quoted'

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chevrolux

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#2146645 17-Dec-2018 18:45

Ahhhhhh very good.

So my only problem.. the value of $message is set from a sql query. So I have no way to use double quotes.

Could I just go "$message" in that api call?

Behodar

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#2146648 17-Dec-2018 19:09

So are $name and $email referenced in the SQL table rather than your PHP code?

chevrolux

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#2146652 17-Dec-2018 19:29

Behodar:

So are $name and $email referenced in the SQL table rather than your PHP code?

Yea the SQL table is just two columns, an index and a message.

So the message is just in the SQL table as exactly "Hi $name, This is a test message. I have also sent an email to $email" (excluding the quotes of course)

It's like that so that a user can easily edit the messages from a form.

That's why I wonder if I need just do a find/replace type function on the string. I can just change the variables inside the string to have different delimiters.

Behodar

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#2146654 17-Dec-2018 19:35

chevrolux: That's why I wonder if I need just do a find/replace type function on the string. I can just change the variables inside the string to have different delimiters.

That's what I was going to suggest in a pinch.

chevrolux

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#2146712 17-Dec-2018 21:19

Yea cool.

I only need 3 or 4 different variables so will just do it with str_replace

Thanks team!

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itxtme

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#2146724 17-Dec-2018 21:41

I would use Heredoc myself, keeps your code tidy

$sql = <<<SQL
SELECT * FROM `sms_msg` WHERE id='1'
SQL;

$smsSql = mysqli_query($conn, $sql);
$a = mysqli_fetch_array($smsSql);

$message = <<<EOF
Hi {$name}, This is a test message. I have also sent an email to {$email}. I can use " marks, or ' marks without issue.
I can access my old query using the same method {$a['title']}
EOF;

$result = $api->sendSms($message,$mobile);

jarledb

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#2146787 18-Dec-2018 00:19

itxtme:

I would use Heredoc myself, keeps your code tidy

$sql = <<<SQL
SELECT * FROM `sms_msg` WHERE id='1'
SQL;

$smsSql = mysqli_query($conn, $sql);
$a = mysqli_fetch_array($smsSql);

$message = <<<EOF
Hi {$name}, This is a test message. I have also sent an email to {$email}. I can use " marks, or ' marks without issue.
I can access my old query using the same method {$a['title']}
EOF;

$result = $api->sendSms($message,$mobile);

I use Heredoc a lot myself, but be careful. If you add another character after the EOF; (a space, tab anything) it will throw an error.

EOF;

on one line, all by itself, no characters after.

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