Preserved Topic: ISSET syntax

In PHP, I have this line:

if (isset($row['cphone'])){
print "TEL;CELL;VOICE:" . $row[cphone] . $ender;
}

I have verified that $row['cphone'] is empty, but it still gets printed. $ender is set to either "\n" normally, or "<br />\n" if a variable is passed via the URL. Either way, I get the same problem - the ISSET thinks that $row['cphone'] is set to something.

Function isset() checks whether variable is initialize or not (initial value can be set to empty string, but the variable is then initialized an isset() function will return true). If you want to check whether variable is empty or not, use empty() function instead...

Kind of off topic, but, what's the difference between print and echo? Is there a benefit to using one over the other?

echo() can accept more than one parameter, while print() can't...

echo $var1, $var2, $var3;

Pug, I have made a handy function:

// isset and not empty

  function issne($var)

  {

    return (isset($var) && !empty($var)) ? true : false;      

  }

in your case you call it as:
if (issne(&$row['cphone']))
{
//whatever ...
}

don't forget to call with the '&' operator.

another variation of this function is this (which takes an array param or a single param as the previous one):

function issne($var)

  {

    if (!is_array($var))

      return isset($var) && !empty($var) ? true : false;      

    else

    {

      $cond = true;

      foreach ($var as $key)

      {

        $cond = $cond && isset($key) && !empty($key);

      }

    }

    return $cond ? 1 : 0;

  }

if (issne(array(&$var1, &$var2))
{
//stuff here
}


DL, there has been lots of discussions about 'echo' v.s 'print' in addition to the calling methods as mr. Max said, it has been noted that 'echo' is faster than 'print'


//lallous

Thanks Max / lallous.