php empty string htmlspecialchars()

Question

So, I am trying to use htmlspecialchars() to protect my website but unfortunately I got stuck in this code:

<?php

function wrap_nome($firstname, $lastname)
{
$join = htmlspecialchars($firstname, ENT_QUOTES) . ' ' . htmlspecialchars($lastname, ENT_QUOTES);
if (mb_strlen($join) > 32)
{
$text = substr($join,0,32);
return $text . " ...";
}
else
{
return $join;
}
}

$nome = wrap_nome($firstname, $lastname);

echo '<span style="color:#7F7F7F;font-family:Arial;font-size:13px;"><b>' . $nome . '</b></span>';

?>

Initially I thought that the problem maybe was the fact that the string $nome had double and single quotes, then I removed them and found out that htmlspecialchars($lastname, ENT_QUOTES) continues to be echoed and htmlspecialchars($firstname, ENT_QUOTES) continues to give me an empty string!

If I do this:

echo '<span style="color:#7F7F7F;font-family:Arial;font-size:13px;"><b>' . htmlspecialchars($nome, ENT_QUOTES) . '</b></span>';

... It wont output anything.

Any ideas of what is causing this ?

yes both variables echo nicely anywhere in the page

Fábio Linhares
– Fábio Linhares

2014-08-19 00:06:14 +00:00
Commented Aug 19, 2014 at 0:06 — Fábio Linhares
– Fábio Linhares, Commented Aug 19, 2014 at 0:06
if i remove htmlspecialchars() everything works

Fábio Linhares
– Fábio Linhares

2014-08-19 00:07:03 +00:00
Commented Aug 19, 2014 at 0:07 — Fábio Linhares
– Fábio Linhares, Commented Aug 19, 2014 at 0:07

Community · Accepted Answer · 2023-11-17 20:33:26Z

3

htmlspecialchars returns FALSE if it gets an error, which happens if $nome contains any characters that can't be represented in the specified character set. The character set defaults to ISO8859-1 before PHP 5.4, UTF-8 since then, try using htmlspecialchars($nome, ENT_QUOTES, 'iso8859-1').

If that doesn't work, see the list of character sets in the documentation and use the appropriate one for your names.

edited Nov 17, 2023 at 20:33

CommunityBot

11 silver badge

answered Aug 18, 2014 at 23:56

Barmar

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8 Comments

Barmar Over a year ago

What language is the name in?

Fábio Linhares Over a year ago

Portuguese from Portugal

Fábio Linhares Over a year ago

$nome = "F.á.b.i.o. .H.e.n.r.r.i.q.u.e."; from the database

Barmar Over a year ago

What encoding is the DB using?

Fábio Linhares Over a year ago

you where right the problem was the "á" caracter!!! I just removed it and it worked. I just have to find the correct character set

|

Richie · Accepted Answer · 2014-08-18 23:55:02Z

0

Simply replace

htmlspecialchars($str,ENT_QUOTES );

with

htmlentities($st ,ENT_QUOTES ,"UTF-8");

answered Aug 18, 2014 at 23:55

Richie

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4 Comments

Sven Over a year ago

Why should the one function work if the other does not? And they are not the same!

Barmar Over a year ago

It's not the function that matters, it's the UTF-8 argument.

Sven Over a year ago

I know, but this should be in the answer.

Richie Over a year ago

So I get a downvote for adding the third argument character set? :(

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