PHP coding question?

Question

Does the following code below do the same thing and if so which one is better when coding? And is there a name for when PHP code is missing curly brackets?

The PHP code.

<?php if (isset($_POST['email'])) { echo $_POST['email']; }?>
<?php if (isset($_POST['email'])) echo $_POST['email'];?>

Answer 1

Personally I always write statements that can use curly braces with curly braces. For example take the code:

if (UserIsLoggedIn())
    ShowCreditCardDetails();

Now if some amateur coder comes along and wants to also do something else when the user is logged in:

if (UserIsLoggedIn())
    WriteAuditLog();
    ShowCreditCardDetails();

Now, ShowCreditCardDetails() will be run for users who aren't logged in, because only the first statement after the if gets executed when no curly braces are present. Had that been:

if (UserIsLoggedIn())
{
    ShowCreditCardDetails();
}

this wouldn't have happened because the curly braces enclose the entire code block to be executed.

I don't believe there's a name for this, it's just a shortened way of writing an if statement. Note I also put the curly braces on their own lines outside of the code block and the original statement as well - it just aids in readability.

Answer 2

if you dont use the curly brackets it does exactly the same thing but it stops after the first ; and the code followed after isn't in the if statement anymore (in your example it doesnt matter since you have only one ; in there). personally, i'd hate this kinds of shortcuts.

Answer 3

In this case you can go with the second version. The reason why you can omit the brackets is that you don't need brackets if the control statement's body only contains one statement:

if (isset($_POST['email'])) 
    echo $_POST['email'];

But of course this can lead to problems if you extend your script and forgot about this:

if (isset($_POST['email'])) 
    echo $_POST['email'];
    echo $_POST['foo'];

Here, echo $_POST['foo']; is not contained in the if statement. Similar is this:

 <?php if (isset($_POST['email'])) echo $_POST['email'];  echo $_POST['foo'];?>

In both cases, echo $_POST['foo']; will be executed regardless of the if clause.

---

But if you use this in a template and just want to print a field if it is set, it is unlikely that you extend this short piece of code. So in this case, the "short" version should be fine.

Update:

Please note stereofrog's comment. Outputting unescaped user input can be very dangerous. NEVER trust user input.

Answer 4

If the block statement count is only one . You no need to put curly braces .

But, If you put the curly braces for single statement also. The code will be in readable format. others can understand easily .

<?php
if (isset($_POST['email']))
 {
 echo $_POST['email']; 
 }
?> 

Now the code will have the indentations.

Answer 5

There is no such thing as "better coding". It's a matter of agreement. Choose your favorite coding standard and follow it's guidelines.

http://pear.php.net/manual/en/standards.php
http://framework.zend.com/manual/en/coding-standard.html

are examples and you can google for php coding standard for more