var_dump() of strings and variables not showing desired results

Question

I am working on a script that curls another site and then parses the results. I seem to be having some weird problems and I can't understand where they are coming from; I have included the problematic part of my code as well as the output that is returned from it below:

<?php
    //my code to do some logic and build the curl

    $BookingConfirmation = curl_exec($ch);

    $testString = 'a test';
    var_dump($testString);
    echo '<br />';
    echo $BookingConfirmation;
    echo '<br />';
    var_dump($BookingConfirmation);
    echo '<br />';

    $bookingResults = explode('|', $BookingConfirmation);

    var_dump($bookingResults);
    die();
?>

when I then load the page, I am getting this output:

string(6) "a test"
booking|1||4000015|23628
string(2386) " booking|1||4000015|23628 "
array(6) { 
    [0]=> string(766) " string(1526) "108^1"> booking" 
    [2]=> string(1) "1" 
    [3]=>     string(0) "" 
    [4]=> string(7) "4000015" 
    [5]=> string(81) "23628 " 
}

So according to what $BookingConfirmation is showing me, I wouldn't expect the array to contain "108^1" anywhere within it. Also, why would the var_dump of $BookingConfirmation be showing that it is a 2386 character string? It is nowhere near that long. Another question is, what is happening with the second element that should be in the array? ($bookingResults[1]) The final dump of that array is showing that there are 6 elements, but with #1 being skipped there are only 5 being shown.

It also might be useful to note that none of these variable names are used anywhere else in the code.

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Well, `string(2386) " booking|1||4000015|23628 "`, That means the string has `2386` bytes. You should look the `view-source` of your test page, instead of the rendered html which is obviously hiding most of the string. — Esailija, Dec 20 '12 at 17:51
@Esailija maybe xdebug settings? Does standard php.ini let you control the behavior of var_dump at all? — ficuscr, Dec 20 '12 at 17:54

Esailija · Accepted Answer · 2012-12-20T17:59:21.750

6

Either use view-source, text/plain content-type, or run it through command line.

<?php
    header("Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8");
    //my code to do some logic and build the curl

    $BookingConfirmation = curl_exec($ch);

    $testString = 'a test';
    var_dump($testString);
    echo '<br />';
    echo $BookingConfirmation;
    echo '<br />';
    var_dump($BookingConfirmation);
    echo '<br />';

    $bookingResults = explode('|', $BookingConfirmation);

    var_dump($bookingResults);
    die();
?>

I suspect the input contained <, which is rendered as some hidden html tag. I mean,string(2386) " booking|1||4000015|23628 ", means the string has 2386 bytes.

edited Dec 20 '12 at 17:59

answered Dec 20 '12 at 17:54

Esailija

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1

ya that worked perfect thanks; turns out there was a hidden input element and one of the values had a pipe (|) in it that was being caught on the explode – ProdigyProgrammer Dec 20 '12 at 18:06
Thank you. How should the < tag be escaped – briankip May 09 '17 at 10:39

score 1 · Answer 2 · edited Apr 15 '19 at 05:42

1

To see the result of the function var_dump() literally, use HTML's pre element:

  echo '<pre>';
  var_dump( $bookingResults );  
  echo '</pre>';

edited Apr 15 '19 at 05:42

Philippe Delteil

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answered Dec 20 '12 at 18:07

SteAp

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score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Mar 05 '15 at 10:21

0

use print_r() with pre tags instead of var_dump()

echo '<pre>';
  print_r( $bookingResults );  
echo '</pre>';

Hope it helps

answered Mar 05 '15 at 10:21

Abhishek Goel

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var_dump() of strings and variables not showing desired results

3 Answers3