PHP ltrim() and rtrim() functions

Question

I need 2 functions that take a string and the number of chars to trim from the right and left side and return it. E.g:

$str = "[test]";
$str = ltrim($str,1); //becomes test]
$str = rtrim($str,1); //becomes test

Thoughts?

Answer 1

function my_rtrim($str, $count) {
  return substr($str, 0, -$count);
}

function my_ltrim($str, $count) {
  return substr($str, $count);
}

See substr().

Answer 2

substr

substr("abcdef", 0, -1);     // 'abcde'
substr("abcdef", 1);         // 'bcdef'

but that's not how ltrim, rtrim functions usually work. They operate with substrings and not indexes.

and obviously:

substr('abcdef', 1, -1)

does what you want in one go.

Answer 3

I believe substr() can do the job. Both the $start and $length arguments can be negative.