[RESOLVED] Help creating a function

Doom87

Ok so i'm trying to create a function called dochead to put a header at the top of a page. Here's how i tried to do it:

<?php

global $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh, $sitename;

$sitename = "MY SITE";
$banner = "http://www.domain.com/images/banner.jpg";
$bannerh = "120";
$bannerw = "760";

function dochead() {
echo "<div align='center'>";
echo "<img src='$banner' width='$bannerw' height='$bannerh' alt='$sitename'>";
echo "</div>";
}

The only thing i can get to display is an empty image.

Any help will be much appreciated.

alimadzi

Add a line at the top of your function declaring all the global variables. Should work then.

Doom87

Do you mean just put this at the top of the function?

global $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh, $sitename;

alimadzi

Doom87 wrote:
Do you mean just put this at the top of the function?

global $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh, $sitename;

Yes, exactly. You either need to declare them as globals inside the function or pass them in as parameters in order for them to have scope within the function.

Doom87

Nope that didn't fix it.

Heres exactly how i have everything:

in a file called mainfile.php i have this:

<?php

global $sitename, $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh;

$sitename = "MY Site";
$banner = "images/banner.png";
$bannerw = "760";
$bannerh = "120";

function dochead() {
global $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh, $sitename;
echo "<div align='center'>";
echo "<img src='$banner' width='$bannerw' height='$bannerh' alt='$sitename'>";
echo "</div>";
}

Then i have my other file called index.php

<?php

include("mainfile.php");
echo "<html>";
echo "<head>";
echo "<title>". $sitename . "</title>";
echo "</head>";
echo "<body>";

dochead();

Everything works so far except for the dochead function.

alimadzi

OK. Add the global declarations after the include() of mainfile.php in your index.php file. And you don't need the global line at the top of mainfile.php.

bradgrafelman

Though alimadzi is right about the global line at the top of mainfile.php being superfluous, your script should work fine; I copied and pasted it to my test server and it worked.

Doom87

Mine still doesn't work. How did u get it to work? I'm so confused right now.

Could it be somthing with my web server.

I made a php version page if u want to take a look at it:
http://www.ootaclan.org/phpinfo.php

bradgrafelman

Doom87 wrote:
How did u get it to work?

I created one file called mytest1.php:

<?php
include("mytest2.php");
echo "<html>";
echo "<head>";
echo "<title>". $sitename . "</title>";
echo "</head>";
echo "<body>";

dochead();

and then a second, called mytest2.php:

<?php

global $sitename, $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh;

$sitename = "MY Site";
$banner = "images/banner.png";
$bannerw = "760";
$bannerh = "120";

function dochead() {
global $banner, $bannerw, $bannerh, $sitename;
echo "<div align='center'>";
echo "<img src='$banner' width='$bannerw' height='$bannerh' alt='$sitename'>";
echo "</div>";
}

I then visited mytest1.php in a browser. Though the image didn't display for obvious reasons, it did generate the correct HTML.

(EDIT: By the way... you do realize that multiple calls to [man]echo[/man], such as in the first script, don't output data on new lines, but rather cram it all together as if you had one long echo statement... right?)

Doom87

Mine still didn't work. I pasted the code into 2 new files called exactly what you typed it. and nothing happened. I left the test files uploaded on my site if u need to see it:
http://www.ootaclan.org/test/mytest1.php

And in regards to whay you said about multiple calls to echo. Yes i realize that but i have no clue how to make it correct.

alimadzi

Looks like it's working now.

About the multiple calls to echo, as long as you're using double quotes you can add a "\n" at the end of an echo call to add a newline to the HTML source. Or do what I do and use heredoc syntax. Much easier IMHO.

Doom87

Wait you got it to work in your browser? In my browser its just a blank white page.

When i go to page -> view source heres what comes up:

<html>
<head>
<title>MY Site</title>
</head>
<body>
<div align='center'>
</div>

The image tag is just absent.

alimadzi

Yeah, just looked again. Your banner says...

"OOTA: Order of the Assassins"

Source is as follows (newlines added for readability)...

<html>
<head>
<title>MY Site</title>
</head>
<body>
<div align='center'>
<img src='images/banner.png' width='760' height='120' alt='MY Site'>
</div>

Doom87

I feel so retarded right now. I just figured out why it was wrong. Turns out my norton considered it an ad and was blocking it. I'm so sorry for wasting everybody's time. Wow it probally worked right from the begining.

Thank-You both for helping me realize that.

alimadzi

No problem and hey, it wasn't a total loss, right? You learned a thing or two about scope, global variables, and adding newlines in an echo statement. So don't feel too bad.

Doom87

True I did. Thank-you