[RESOLVED] Uninitialized string offset php notice

[rremm2000]

Thanks for reading my question

Notice: Uninitialized string offset: 0 in /home/public_html/testing/inc/class/template.engine.class.php on line 779

Line 779 is

 778             $var = $this->PARSEVARS[$value];
 779             IF ( $field{0} == '.' ){
 780                  $field = substr($field, 1);
 781             }

I'm not sure what the {0} is for I couldn't find anything on php.net but anyway the value being passed is as follows is empty

ERROR: [TE ERROR] FIELD0 = Value = SRCH_NOT_ROBOT, field = , param=
So $field{0} appears to be empty.

[YAOMK]

could it be a typo in referencing the first index of the $field array?

$field[0]

But of course if that was the case the following wouldn't make much sense:

$field = substr($field, 1);

Curly braces are used to tell php evaluate what is inside the curly braces, so {0} is just evaluating that integer.

[bradgrafelman]

Actually, if you read this bit in the manual, you'll see that strings can be treated as arrays and that each character is an array item, so $string[0] would mean the first character of the string (assuming $string is a string). As noted, using curly braces is a deprecated manner of achieving the same result.

The problem, however, seems to be that $field[0] doesn't exist. What you should also be checking is that $field is set (you didn't show us where it was defined) and that it contains the correct type of value (e.g. it doesn't contain FALSE if a function failed).

[YAOMK]

Yes as I was searching about it, I came across this example:

$x="test";
$y=$x{2};
echo $y;

//will display "s".

Thanks for the clarification Brad.

[rremm2000]

So what exactly do they mean by curly braces is a deprecated way as of php6 does it mean that it's going away?

I assume that I should switch to [] brackets and doe something like

          IF ( !empty( $field ) ){
               IF ( $field[0] == '.' ) $field = substr($field, 1);
          }

OR

              IF ( isSet( $field ) ){
                   IF ( $field[0] == '.' ) $field = substr($field, 1);
              }        

OR

              IF (  $field != '' ){
                   IF ( $field[0] == '.' ) $field = substr($field, 1);
              }        

Seems to me not using functions when possible is better but not sure which is best in long term.

[bradgrafelman]

rremm2000 wrote:

So what exactly do they mean by curly braces is a deprecated way as of php6 does it mean that it's going away?

Yes, it means that using curly braces is a coding practice that is considered out of date and not recommended.

rremm2000 wrote:

eems to me not using functions when possible is better

Are you talking about using isset/empty() compared to the last if() statement? If so, then you may be right, but this isn't a situation when it's "possible" then, since the point of using one of those two is to check that the variable is set first, otherwise you'll generate a notice/warning.

Also, you can certainly combine the conditions into one if() statement since the condition is evaluated from left to right, ex.

if(isset($field) && $field[0] == '.')

[rremm2000]

Thanks and will do!