Efficiency of Opening and Closing Delimiters

[douceur]

I've been wondering recently if it's inefficient to open and close delimeters repeatedly (I'm not actually sure if this is the proper terminology) in your PHP code. For example:

<?php
x = 1;
if (x == 1) {
?>
text
<?php
}
else {
?>
other text
<?php
}
?>

versus

<?php
x = 1;
if (x == 1) {
   echo 'text';
}
else {
   echo 'other text';
}
?>

Obviously that's a rather simple example, but you can see what I mean. Any ideas?

[bpat1434]

I would say this:

For long drawn-out HTML where no PHP is involved, escaping from PHP would be better. Less strain on the server.

That's all I can really say. The only difference is whether the PHP parser looks at the string or not. If not, it's "skipped". It's really a matter of personal preference. If you like to use embedded PHP, by all means, use it. If you want to use straight up PHP and echo or print the HTML, do that. Unless you're doing some major programming, I doubt you'll actually see any difference.

~Brett