PHP multiline string with PHP

Question

I need to echo a lot of PHP and HTML.

I already tried the obvious, but it's not working:

<?php echo '
<?php if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) {   ?>
      <div class="gridly-image"><a href="<?php the_permalink() ?>"><?php the_post_thumbnail('summary-image', array('class' => 'overlay', 'title'=> the_title('Read Article ',' now',false) ));?></a>
      </div>
      <?php }  ?>

      <div class="date">
      <span class="day">
        <?php the_time('d') ?></span>
      <div class="holder">
        <span class="month">
          <?php the_time('M') ?></span>
        <span class="year">
          <?php the_time('Y') ?></span>
      </div>
    </div>
    <?php }  ?>';
?>

How can I do it?

well besides the obvious issues with the unescaped quotes you should als convert all < and > tags to their coresponding html code < > — transilvlad, Sep 22 '12 at 00:23
Most people asking this question would be looking for HEREDOC. You may want to accept that answer. — Archonic, Apr 30 '15 at 17:48

score 61 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 21 '12 at 16:59

You don't need to output php tags:

<?php 
    if ( has_post_thumbnail() ) 
    {
        echo '<div class="gridly-image"><a href="'. the_permalink() .'">'. the_post_thumbnail('summary-image', array('class' => 'overlay', 'title'=> the_title('Read Article ',' now',false) )) .'</a></div>';
    }

    echo '<div class="date">
              <span class="day">'. the_time('d') .'</span>
              <div class="holder">
                <span class="month">'. the_time('M') .'</span>
                <span class="year">'. the_time('Y') .'</span>
              </div>
          </div>';
?>

Internet, you surprise me every day :)* – Numabyte Feb 02 '21 at 07:27 — Numabyte, Feb 02 '21 at 07:27

score 59 · Answer 2 · edited Feb 13 '16 at 11:09

You cannot run PHP code within a string like that. It just doesn't work. As well, when you're "out" of PHP code (?>), any text outside of the PHP blocks is considered output anyway, so there's no need for the echo statement.

If you do need to do multiline output from with a chunk of PHP code, consider using a HEREDOC:

<?php

$var = 'Howdy';

echo <<<EOL
This is output
And this is a new line
blah blah blah and this following $var will actually say Howdy as well

and now the output ends
EOL;

score 24 · Answer 3 · edited Sep 21 '12 at 17:09

24

Use Heredocs to output muli-line strings containing variables. The syntax is...

$string = <<<HEREDOC
   string stuff here
HEREDOC;

The "HEREDOC" part is like the quotes, and can be anything you want. The end tag must be the only thing on it's line i.e. no whitespace before or after, and must end in a colon. For more info check out the manual.

edited Sep 21 '12 at 17:09

gen_Eric

223,194
41
299
337

answered Sep 21 '12 at 17:02

noel

2,257
3
24
39

hitautodestruct · Answer 4 · 2021-03-03T08:57:27.810

Use the colon notation

Another option would be to use the if with a colon (:) and an endif instead of the brackets:

<?php if ( has_post_thumbnail() ): ?>
    <div class="gridly-image">
        <a href="<?php the_permalink(); ?>">
        <?php the_post_thumbnail('summary-image', array('class' => 'overlay', 'title'=> the_title('Read Article ',' now',false) )); ?>
        </a>
    </div>
<?php endif; ?>

<div class="date">
    <span class="day"><?php the_time('d'); ?></span>
    <div class="holder">
        <span class="month"><?php the_time('M'); ?></span>
        <span class="year"><?php the_time('Y'); ?></span>
    </div>
</div>

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Sep 21 '12 at 16:59

The internal set of single quotes in your code is killing the string. Whenever you hit a single quote it ends the string and continues processing. You'll want something like:

$thisstring = 'this string is long \' in needs escaped single quotes or nothing will run';

score 0 · Answer 6 · edited Feb 13 '16 at 11:11

0

To do that, you must remove all ' charachters in your string or use an escape character. Like:

<?php
    echo '<?php
              echo \'hello world\';
          ?>';
?>

edited Feb 13 '16 at 11:11

Peter Mortensen

30,738
21
105
131

answered Sep 21 '12 at 17:03

Afshin

4,197
3
25
34

score 0 · Answer 7 · edited Feb 13 '16 at 11:12

0

Use the show_source(); function of PHP. Check for more details in show_source. This is a better method I guess.

edited Feb 13 '16 at 11:12

Peter Mortensen

30,738
21
105
131

answered Sep 21 '12 at 17:11

mridul4c

8,197
3
19
28

PHP multiline string with PHP

7 Answers7

Use the colon notation

Linked