Illegal string offset in third variable only

Question

I am having an extremely weird problem that does not make sense to me.

I am getting the "Illegal string offset" in my third variable that is part of the array in a foreach loop no matter what the data is pulling from. At first it thought it was an issue with my Date formatting but if I change it to another field it's the same error message only with that field name in place.

The code looks like this:

$posts = get_tableContents($con,'posts');
foreach($posts as $post)
{
    $postID = $post['id'];
    $post = $post['subject'];
    $mydate = "something to test";
    $datePosted = $post['date'];

    echo $mydate." <a class='community' href='displayNews.php?post=".$postID."'>".$post."</a>".$datePosted."<br />";
}

If I switch $datePosted with $post the same issue happens just changes the error to say subject instead of date.

Results: Warning: Illegal string offset 'subject' in D:\xampp\htdocs\snj\news.php on line 26 something to test 2014-09-09

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Here is the function I am calling in case it is something in there:

function get_tableContents($con,$table)
{
    $results = array();
    $sql = mysqli_query($con, "SELECT * FROM $table")
        or die ("Error: " . mysqli_error($con));
    while($row = mysqli_fetch_array($sql)) 
    {
        $results[] = $row;    
    }

    return $results;
}

Are You sure u have subject key in your array? var_dump($posts); before foreach and after get_tableContents(); — trzyeM-
– trzyeM-, Commented Nov 9, 2014 at 17:04
You are re assigning $post in the loop.. Then try to use it like an array.. Call your variables something different t — John Ruddell
– John Ruddell, Commented Nov 9, 2014 at 17:13

John Ruddell · Accepted Answer · 2014-11-09 17:20:24Z

1

Per my comment. In your loop you make $post equal to the post subject... And then try to pull out something else from post.

Aka $post = $post['subject']; Change that to$postSubject = $post['subject'];

Also check the case.. You may need to do $post['Subject'] in case the column name is a capital s on subject

answered Nov 9, 2014 at 17:20

John Ruddell

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2 Comments

jAC Over a year ago

ugggh! Silly me. It's been a long weekend and didn't catch that. Thanks so much John!

John Ruddell Over a year ago

@jAC No problem!! Glad I could help. Thanks for the quick response and uovote. I'll reciprocate :)

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