How can I echo the new line character as if it was in a single quote string?
$foo = 'foo';
$nl = getStringWithNewLineCharacter();
$bar = 'bar';
echo $foo . $nl . $bar;
will output :
foo
bar
What I want is :
foo
bar
(Obviously, I do not control the return value of the getStringWithNewLineCharacter() function.)
Or said differently, how can I force a variable to be interpreted as a single quote string?
EDIT
While answers provided gave a workaround, the real question here is how to interpret a double quoted string variable as a single quoted string variable. Maybe it's not possible, I don't know. To answer this, it requires understanding of how the interpreter manages string variables (which I lack).
So :
you have to use the ', not the "', like this echo ' ' not echo " "
Just escape the backslash, that neutralizes its behavior:
echo "foo\
bar";
You can write that in a literal manner as above or in a string replacement command, whatever. The outcome is the same: the literal characters \ and n next to each other instead of the line feed character:
echo $foo . str_replace("
", "\
", $nl) . $bar;
Or obviously:
echo $foo . str_replace("
", '
', $nl) . $bar;
Once the " " character is in the variable, it's already converted to newline. You will need to convert it back.
$nl = preg_replace("#
#", '
', $nl);
Not totally sure this is what you want but here goes anyway.
I think you are saying that you have no control over the returned value of getStringWithNewLineCharacter(); and you think it is returning " " i.e. a newline control character sequence.
This would simply convert the " " to ' '
<?php
$foo = 'foo';
$nl = "
";
$bar = 'bar';
echo $foo . $nl . $bar; // 2 lines
echo PHP_EOL;
$nl = str_replace("
", '
', $nl);
echo $foo . $nl . $bar; // one line
echo PHP_EOL;
RESULTS:
foo
bar
foo
bar
Or if you want to make it permanent at least for the duration of this script do :-
$nl = str_replace("
", '
',getStringWithNewLineCharacter());
<?php
$foo = 'foo';
$nl = htmlspecialchars('
');
$bar = 'bar';
echo $foo . $nl . $bar;
?>