Adding A Dynamic Link In Php

Question

I have been using the following to add a dynamic link on a page I am writing, it works ok and appears how it should on the page but I cant help but think that I am going a bit backwards with the way its written as it looks messy. What is the correct way to write it, as if I put it all in one line it doesn't work ?..

echo '<a href="./customer-files/';
        echo $customerID;
        echo '/';
        echo $filename->getFilename();
        echo '">';
              echo $filename->getFilename();
    echo '</a>';

Community · Accepted Answer · 2023-11-17 19:59:20Z

1

Try with

echo "<a href=\"./customer-files/{$customerID}/{$filename->getFilename()}\">{$filename->getFilename()}</a>";

Here there is the documentation with a lot of examples of how to concatenate output.

edited Nov 17, 2023 at 19:59

CommunityBot

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answered Mar 27, 2012 at 10:20

Davide Gualano

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4 Comments

halfer Over a year ago

I'd not recommend that approach, since it doesn't highlight HTML in an IDE, and may require horizontal scrolling when editing. I think lines should be shorter, where possible.

halfer Over a year ago

Ah, and your variables won't get expanded, since you're inside single quotes, not double quotes.

Davide Gualano Over a year ago

I've corrected the single quotes issue. Regarding your first comment, I have not thought about IDEs. About the line length, it's just a matter of personal tastes I think. Thanks anyway!

halfer Over a year ago

No worries, the swap of ideas is good :), +1. There used to be a recommendation for 80 characters, though with wider screens these days that is perhaps a little defunct; I work to 100. It's worth noting though that some template code doesn't allow for it (e.g. a long <a> plus its content - breaking the content into a new indent introduces unwanted space). More here if you're interested.

Quentin · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-27 10:27:51Z

0

I'd approach it like this:

$safe_customer_id = htmlspecialchars(urlencode($customerID));
$safe_filename = htmlspecialchars(urlencode($filename->getFilename()));
$safe_label = htmlspecialchars($filename->getFilename());
echo "<a href=\"./customer-files/$safe_customer_id/$safe_filename\">$safe_label</a>";

edited Mar 27, 2012 at 10:27

answered Mar 27, 2012 at 10:21

Quentin

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2 Comments

Iain Simpson Over a year ago

Thanks :) , will this remove any spaces etc from the filename too ?

Quentin Over a year ago

It won't remove them, it will replace them with URL safe alternatives … but that's a good point. It shouldn't be done on the visible filename. (Answer edited)

Rene Pot · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-27 10:19:37Z

0

I would go with this:

$fn = $filename->getFilename();
$link = $customerID . '/' . $fn;
echo '<a href="'.$link.'">'.$fn.'</a>';

answered Mar 27, 2012 at 10:19

Rene Pot

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Comments

halfer · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-27 10:27:04Z

0

If you're using a template layer, it is even better to break out into PHP only when you need to:

<a href="./customer-files/<?php
    echo $customerID . '/' . $filename->getFilename()
?>">
    <?php echo $filename->getFilename() ?>
</a>

This way, your IDE will correctly highlight your HTML as well as your PHP. I've also ensured that all PHP is in single-line blobs, which is the best approach for templates (lengthy statements should be banished to a controller/script).

answered Mar 27, 2012 at 10:27

halfer

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Comments

Starx · Accepted Answer · 2012-03-27 14:47:47Z

0

Concatenation is your friend. Use a . to combine multiple string expression into one.

echo '<a href="./customer-files/'.$customerID.'/'.$filename->getFilename().'">'.$filename->getFilename()/'</a>';

Even better way would be

$filename = $filename -> getFilename(); //cache the filename
echo "<a href='/$customerId/$filename'>$filename</a>";
  // ^ On this echo NOTICE that variables can be DIRECTLY placed inside Double qoutes.

edited Mar 27, 2012 at 14:47

answered Mar 27, 2012 at 10:18

Starx

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3 Comments

halfer Over a year ago

Problem with your <a> is that you're using single quotes for attributes; that'll not produce standards-compliant HTML, afaik.

halfer Over a year ago

Just looked, and apologies - you're quite right. I was quite positive HTML5 and XHTML both require speech marks rather than apostrophes for attributes, and it turns out neither of them do. Even XML! :-o I had no idea.

Starx Over a year ago

@halfer, Great, I am removing my comment then !

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