Print X number of words in string

[Anon]

Hi,

I'm looking for a simple way to print the first 50 words called from a long description text row in a MySQL db to be used on a search results page.

I've been all through the PHP documentation but can find only string functions that refer to character count.

As I don't want to have words cut off in their prime how do I work around this to specify an actual word count to be printed?

Thanks in advance,

Gary

[Anon]

Pretty simple.

//$description is the string you want to truncate.

//Make an array.
$words = explode(" ",$description);

//Build your string from the array.
for($i = 0; $i < 50; $i++)
{
$output .= $words[$i];
}
echo $output;

--brian

[Anon]

Brian,

A little modification to account for an existing loop that the description was in, and the addition of the space stripped out in the explode and that now works:

$description = $row["Bio_$lang"];
$words = explode(" ",$description);
$i = 0;
while ($i < 13) {
echo ("$words[$i] ");
$i++;
}

With the $i = 0; stated outside of both loops...

Thanks!

Gary