Wicked Cool PHP

#26: Trimming Excess Whitespace

Excess whitespace is a constant problem when working with form data. The trim() function is usually the first tool a programmer turns to, because it removes any excess spaces from the beginning or end of a string. For example, " Wicked Cool PHP " becomes "Wicked Cool PHP." In fact, it's so handy that you may find yourself using it on almost every available piece of user-inputted, non-array data:

$user_input = trim($user_input);

But sometimes you have excessive whitespace inside a string—when someone may be cutting and copying information from an email, for instance. In that case, you can replace multiple spaces and other whitespace with a single space by using the preg_replace() function. The reg stands for regular ...