Using PHP in HTML pages without messing up Character Encoding

Question

I'm using various php codes in most of html files from our website. I want html files treated as php, thefore I've added this line to the .htaccess

AddHandler application/x-httpd-php5 .html .htm .php

Now, everything is fine, my html files evaluate the php code and i am happy. However my happiness was short lived because this solution created another problem. Character Encoding got messed up and now although i declared

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">

characters are being displayed like this on the website

c�nd �ncearc? s? �?i scad?

My question is how can i evaluate php in the html files and NOT messing up my Character Encoding of the Html pages.

Requested to show code:

<h1 class="Normal-P"><span class="Normal-C-C0">&quot; Cele </span><span class="Normal-C-C1">3 MARI GREŞELI</span><span class="Normal-C-C0"> pe care majoritatea le fac atunci când încearcă </span></h1>

<h1 class="Normal-P"><span class="Normal-C-C0">să îşi </span><span class="Normal-C-C1">scadă colesterolul în mod natural </span><span class="Normal-C-C0">&quot;</span></h1>

results in this

Click pe butonul din stanga jos pentru redare....Asteapt? c�teva secunde p�n? cand acest video se �ncarc?

@RaduS You may also have a byte order mark issue it's a possibility and should not be left out of the equation. — Funk Forty Niner
– Funk Forty Niner, Commented Aug 13, 2013 at 22:14
@RaduS I think what the problem may be now, is the type of editor you are using. I created a file with plain Windows Notepad, and it did not show the characters correctly. However, when I pasted my codes into Notepad++ and saved it as "Encoding/Encode in UTF-8 with or without BOM", it displayed correctly. Visit notepad-plus-plus.org to download it if you wish. That's the best advice I can give you. Good luck. — Funk Forty Niner
– Funk Forty Niner, Commented Aug 13, 2013 at 22:34
@RaduS You're welcome. I learned that lesson the hard way also. Has your problem been resolved? — Funk Forty Niner
– Funk Forty Niner, Commented Aug 13, 2013 at 22:39

Funk Forty Niner · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-13 22:42:39Z

1

I think what the problem may be now, is the type of editor you are using.

I created a file with plain Windows Notepad, and it did not show the characters correctly.

However, when I pasted my codes into Notepad++ and saved it as "Encoding/Encode in UTF-8 without BOM" (byte order mark), it displayed correctly.

Visit notepad-plus-plus.org to download it. It has different encoding formats.

answered Aug 13, 2013 at 22:42

Funk Forty Niner

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2 Comments

RaduS Over a year ago

Thank you Fred, i just finished correcting all files...it was a painful process but worth it ;)

Funk Forty Niner Over a year ago

@RaduS That's great news. Yes I agree it is a lot of work, that is why I like to use includes as navigation menus, etc., so I only have 1 file to edit if I need to modify something globally. I take care of some rather large websites and I would not be happy to edit 100's of files per server. All the best, cheers!

boen_robot · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-13 22:56:27Z

0

The problem seems to be that your HTTP Content-Type header needs to also set UTF-8 explicitly.

To do that without modifying your files, in your php.ini, add/change

default_charset = "UTF-8"

Alternatively, right before you're about to send output, in PHP, do:

header('Content-Type: text/html;charset=UTF-8');

Example start of an HTML file:

<?php
header('Content-Type: text/html;charset=UTF-8');
?><!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

edited Aug 13, 2013 at 22:56

answered Aug 13, 2013 at 21:43

boen_robot

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2 Comments

RaduS Over a year ago

thank you @boen_robot I tried the first variant in the php.ini and it didn't help or maybe i didn't do it right. I want to implement the second suggestion you mentioned but i don't quite understand where specifically you want me to put the line header('Content-Type: text/html;charset=UTF-8');

boen_robot Over a year ago

At the top of HTML files, before any content (including DTD and whitespace), within a "\<?php" block. I've edited the answer above with a more complete example.

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