str_replace not working with txt file PHP

Question

str_replace doesn't seem to be working as we expect it to.

We have a text file and we're trying to remove part of the file.

while(!feof($bodyfile)) {

    $content = @fgets($bodyfile);

    $content = str_replace("MARGIN","",$content);

(Obviously fopen is used to open the file as 'r') Strangely enough, finding and replacing M works? but not margin..

yes we are trying to find the uppercase MARGIN and replace it with nothing... — 30secondstosam
– 30secondstosam, Commented Oct 9, 2012 at 9:10
$content is a text file that can be handled line by line. why has someone voted this question down? — 30secondstosam
– 30secondstosam, Commented Oct 9, 2012 at 9:10
can you add .. the content to pastebin .. i would like to test myself — Baba
– Baba, Commented Oct 9, 2012 at 9:17

Nikola K. · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-09 09:17:05Z

4

UPDATE:

fgets() function reads only 1 line at the time, and by putting that line in your $content variable, you're overwriting the replacement for previous line, and doing it over and over again.

Try with this:

$content = "";
while(!feof($bodyfile)) {

    $line = @fgets($bodyfile);

    $content .= str_replace("MARGIN","",$line);

So, what this code does is reading the line and assigning it to the $line variable, and then adding the replaced string to your $content variable.

By adding @ sign in front of your functions, you're suppressing errors which that function gives.
Try to remove @ from your @fgets and see if there's any error.

Try var_dump($content) or echo $content to see if file is loaded correctly.

Remember that str_replace() is case sensitive.

edited Oct 9, 2012 at 9:17

answered Oct 9, 2012 at 9:09

Nikola K.

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4 Comments

30secondstosam Over a year ago

var_dump shows the whole thing is a bunch of strings. which is what we want. removing the @ didn't do anything as there were no errors to suppress. the file looks to be loading fine. the file is basically a line by line text document of data that has html in. May I point out that also, we can str_replace ONE character but when choosing multiple is doesnt work... I thought this was because the file was being read character by character but i dont think that is the case after some investigation with line breaks

Baba Over a year ago

@Nikola K. reading one line is valid and they can be so many text in a line .... it is fgetc that many not be valid in this case ...

30secondstosam Over a year ago

Sorry - that one just loops forever :(. could this be a character encoding issue?

Baba Over a year ago

@30secondstosam that is why i asked you to add the content to pastbin .. understand what we are dealing with

Sudhir Bastakoti · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-09 09:19:11Z

0

you could do:

$str=implode("",file('somefile.txt'));
$fp=fopen('somefile.txt','w');
$str=str_replace('MARGIN','',$str);
//OR
//$str=str_ireplace('MARGIN','',$str); for case insensitivity
fwrite($fp,$str,strlen($str));

answered Oct 9, 2012 at 9:19

Sudhir Bastakoti

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Comments

30secondstosam · Accepted Answer · 2012-10-09 09:36:48Z

0

Just found out the file is a UTF-16 character encoding rather than UTF-8 for some obscure reason. Converted, now my method originally works!

Thanks to all for suggestions

answered Oct 9, 2012 at 9:36

30secondstosam

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