Formatting string to display as list using php

Question

I have the contents of a textarea being stored in a PHP string after it is submitted by the user. I am hoping to be able to tweak the formatting of the contents of that string, such that it will be displayable as a list when it is echoed. In other words, I would need to insert UL and /UL at the beginning and end, respectively, and LI and /LI and the beginning and end of each line.

Before I mess with my code, I was wondering if anyone knows if this is this even possible? Are carriage returns sent via textarea submit? Any help/comments would be much appreciated.

[EDIT]

I have defined some variables to give myself all the necessary HTML stuff. The 'repertoire' variable is the original string containing text sent from user input.

$repertoire = ($_POST['repertoire']); 

$list_start = '<UL>';
$list_end = '</UL>';
$list_end = '</UL>';
$list_start_line = '<LI>'; 
$list_end_line = '</LI>';

The following is an example of what would be submitted by the user, and therefore, what would constitute the original $repertoire string:

Luciano Berio - Circles

Mike Svoboda - Piangero la sorte mia

Nicholas von Ritter-Zahony - New Piece

Stefano Gervasoni - Due Poesie Francesi di Rilke

So we would at least need the following:

$repertoire_formatted = substr_replace($list_start, $repertoire, $list_end);

...but I don't know how to substitute <LI> for line breaks; also, I cannot know in advance the length of the string or of each line.

yes, that is possible, do mess with your code and show us what you've tried — lovelace
– lovelace, Commented Nov 25, 2018 at 10:27
This is what will be submitted from the textarea. I was hoping that it might be possible to format this without converting it to an array (for complicated reasons). — Paul Clift
– Paul Clift, Commented Nov 25, 2018 at 10:36
Please edit question and add info to post instead of leaving comment — Mohammad
– Mohammad, Commented Nov 25, 2018 at 10:42

Mohammad · Accepted Answer · 2018-11-25 10:48:45Z

1

You can use regex to selecting every line and wrap it in <li></li>

$html = preg_replace("/([^\n]+)/", "<li>$1</li>", $repertoire);
$html = "<ul>\n$html</ul>";

Check result in demo

answered Nov 25, 2018 at 10:48

Mohammad

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1 Comment

Paul Clift Over a year ago

That is a very elegant solution!

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