Print HTML tags in PHP output

Question

I have HTML tags present inside php variable. I want to print the values as it is. Here is what i tried.

$str = "A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>";

echo htmlentities($str);
// Outputs: A 'quote' is &lt;b&gt;bold&lt;/b&gt;

echo $str; //out puts as follows

A 'quote' is bold

But i want to print it as

 A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>

Also, Is there any setting can be done at the TOP of the php page, so that i dont need to use it in every php variables ?

If you want to send HTML tags verbatim, don't use htmlentities(). If you want to show the tags in the browser as literal text, you need to escape it as you are doing currently. Please clarify what you actually want to do — Bojangles
– Bojangles, Commented Feb 23, 2014 at 12:40
No you haven't. What are you doing with this text? Echoing it to a browser or something else? — Bojangles
– Bojangles, Commented Feb 23, 2014 at 12:47

Shiva · Accepted Answer · 2014-02-23 13:04:05Z

7

Just use

 $str = "A 'quote' is <b>bold</b> ";

echo htmlspecialchars($str);

because htmlentities convert some characters to HTML entities.

You should instead use htmlspecialchars

It replaces characters as below:

'&' (ampersand) becomes &amp;
'"' (double quote) becomes &quot; when ENT_NOQUOTES is not set.
"'" (single quote) becomes &#039; only when ENT_QUOTES is set.
'<' (less than) becomes &lt;
'>' (greater than) becomes &gt;

You can check php fiddle here

edited Feb 23, 2014 at 13:04

answered Feb 23, 2014 at 12:43

Shiva

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6 Comments

logan Over a year ago

It is printing as A 'quote' is bold (bold in bold format). Please read my question

Shiva Over a year ago

hey don't downvote Ok. Its you who didn't post the question correctly and then edited it to make sense

logan Over a year ago

I just edited echo $str output. but my original question says A 'quote' is bold is expected output. I did not change that. Still my requirement is A 'quote' is bold ; Please edit your answer to accept answer

logan Over a year ago

echo htmlspecialchars($str); is not outputing anything to browser

logan Over a year ago

let us continue this discussion in chat

|

Kamehameha · Accepted Answer · 2014-02-23 13:10:31Z

3

This should work -

$str = "A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>";
echo "<xmp>".$str."</xmp>";
//Outputs - A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>

EDIT:

<XMP> is deprecated as was pointed out in the comments, and this seems to be the workaround for it(using the <PRE> tag and htmlentities)-

$str = "A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>";
echo "<pre>".htmlentities($str)."</pre>";
//Outputs - A 'quote' is <b>bold</b>

edited Feb 23, 2014 at 13:10

answered Feb 23, 2014 at 12:51

Kamehameha

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5 Comments

logan Over a year ago

Great ! it seems, i need to set <xmp> everytime for all variables, Is there any setup done at the begining of the page ?

Kamehameha Over a year ago

It's an html tag. So a good idea would be use a function, taking the parameter as the input string and returning the above echo.

Shiva Over a year ago

xmp tag is deprecated check this post stackoverflow.com/questions/4545/what-was-the-xmp-tag-used-for

logan Over a year ago

@Shiva : so what is the replacement for that ?

Kamehameha Over a year ago

@Shiva It is old, but it seemed to work for me all the time. Even your thread says so(and it's replacement is debated too). But you are right, it is deprecated.

BenMorel · Accepted Answer · 2014-02-23 22:50:00Z

0

If you want to print HTML, don't use htmlentities.

If this is user input, you should still filter it.

Edit:

If you want the browser to show the text as A 'quote' is bold, htmlspecialchars or htmlentities is the correct function to use as they escape the HTML code and the browser will show the tags as you want.

edited Feb 23, 2014 at 22:50

BenMorel

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answered Feb 23, 2014 at 12:41

max-m

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3 Comments

logan Over a year ago

It is printing as A 'quote' is bold (bold in bold format). Please read my question

logan Over a year ago

The samething I am explaining. I just edited echo $str output. but my original question says A 'quote' is bold is expected output. I did not change that. Still my requirement is A 'quote' is bold ; Please edit your answer to accept answer

max-m Over a year ago

A 'quote' is bold is printed and is what you've specified. And then I don't see your problem with htmlentities. This is the output of your code jsfiddle.net/t7Kra

Tim · Accepted Answer · 2024-12-26 22:43:35Z

0

What worked for me was to use the PHP HEREDOC syntax to stuff the html into a PHP string --

<pre>
<?php
$str=<<<HEREDOC
html code including most anything (but not more php)
HEREDOC;
echo htmlentities($str);
?>
</pre>

edited Dec 26, 2024 at 22:43

answered Dec 26, 2024 at 22:42

Tim

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Comments

logan · Accepted Answer · 2014-02-23 13:43:28Z

-1

to make it as setting..

<?php

function my_custom_echo($str)
{
echo htmlspecialchars($str);
}

my_custom_echo("<p>what ever I want </P>")


?>

answered Feb 23, 2014 at 13:43

logan

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