PHP minus symbol in URL (rawurlencode vs urlencode)

Question

I've tried using rawurlencode and urlencode, both give me "&" and the other "+".

What i'm asking is, is there a PHP function that puts "-" in between words, like on Stack Overflow?

Thanks

Sorry, I understand neither part of your question and what they have to do with each other. Can you clarify? — Pekka, Feb 28 '11 at 19:48
$url = 'your url here'; $url = str_replace(' ', '-', $url); .. that easy — ahmet2106, Feb 28 '11 at 19:49

Entity · Accepted Answer · 2011-02-28T19:54:21.963

If thats all you're trying to do, you could just use:

    $url = str_replace(" ", "-", $url);

And then use urlencode to encode it after that. E.G.:

    function myurlencode($url)
    {
        return urlencode(str_replace(" ", "-", $url));
    }

EDIT

And according to the PHP manual, it replaces all non-alphanumeric characters except -_. with a percent (%) sign followed by two hex digits and spaces encoded as plus (+) signs.

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 28 '11 at 19:49

0

rawurlencode and urlencode are for making URL's the correct format. If you want to replace spaces for dashes you need to use str_replace:

str_replace(" ", "-", $url);

answered Feb 28 '11 at 19:49

Ewan Heming

4,628
2
21
20

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Feb 28 '11 at 19:49

If you just want to replace a class of characters with another, use str_replace

For example:

$newURL = str_replace(" ", "-", $oldURL);

would do what you want

urlencode is a very specific set of character replacements, which follow the standard for url encoding.

score 0 · Answer 4 · answered Feb 28 '11 at 19:53

Okay, as mentioned url_encode is independent from making URLs from text ie to make them SEO-friendly. Usually this is called slugify an url. I guess this is generally what you're looking for, right?

Here is an example of such a method http://sourcecookbook.com/en/recipes/8/function-to-slugify-strings-in-php

PHP minus symbol in URL (rawurlencode vs urlencode)

4 Answers4