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Matching entries in flat file db to form input

Despite being a complete php newbie, I took on this challenge at work :D

What I want to do is:
- Take the contents of a textarea form (in this case, a news article)
- Compare it to a simple list of 1000 words in a text file
- If a word in the article matches one in the list, print it as normal; if not, highlight it.

So far, I have...

[PHP]/* Get the form contents */
$article = $_POST["article"];

/* Create array from word list (list from http://www.giwersworld.org/computers/linux/common-words.phtml) */
$fp = fopen('wordlist.txt','r');
if (!$fp) {exit('Error: Unable to open word list.');}
$wordlist = explode("\n", $fp);[/PHP]

But I don't think the array's being created properly...

I think I need to run a foreach loop to do the actual comparing/printing part, but can anyone help me with actual guts of it?

Thanks :)
Nov 14 '06 #1
5 1437
steven
143 100+
Ok, firstly, you're using fopen and then taking each element and exploding it into a string. Why not just use file_get_contents instead of fopen?

file_get_contents will return a string containing the entire contents of the file.

So start by creating a new array of the words you want to match

Expand|Select|Wrap|Line Numbers
  1. $list = array("hello", "world", "today", "blah");
  2.  
Then loop through that array with a foreach.

Expand|Select|Wrap|Line Numbers
  1. foreach ($list as $word) {
  2.   str_replace($word, "<span style='background-color: red'>".$word."</span>", $fp);
  3. }
  4.  
This should go through each word in your words list and replace any occurences of it with the same word contained in span html tags with a background style set.
Nov 14 '06 #2
steven
143 100+
Sorry, I jumped into that without reading it properly...

Ok, it should be almost the same code as it's the same idea, but...

you need to close the file afterwards.

fclose($fp);

Now I see you explode the word list, this isn't necessary. You should want to keep the wordlist as an array. This way, you can traverse this array and replace any occurences of the word in your article text, the way I've shown in the code above.

Also, I really recommend reading http://php.net/

The manual and documentation is really good.
Nov 14 '06 #3
Thanks Steve :)

Ok, so now I have:

[PHP] /* Get the form contents */
$rawarticle = $_POST[ "article" ];

/* Create array from word list (list from http://www.giwersworld.org/computers/linux/common-words.phtml) */
$fp = fopen( 'wordlist.txt', 'r' );
if ( !$fp ) { exit( 'Error: Unable to open word list.' ); }
$list = explode( "\n", $fp );

/* Check each word in the article */
foreach ( $list as $word ) {
$fixedarticle = str_replace( $word, "<span style='background-color: red'>".$word."</span>", $article );
}

echo $fixedarticle;

/* Close the word file */
fclose( $fp );[/PHP]

Firstly, I need it to highlight words that *aren't* in the list (it's all about trimming the English down for non-native speakers). So suppose I need to check the $article string for each $word, and add the styling if it's not in the list...

Secondly, now it isn't outputting anything and I'm not entirely sure why...
Nov 14 '06 #4
Ok, I've found an easier way of making the word list array.

[PHP]/* Get the form contents */
$article = stripslashes($_POST[ "article" ]);
$fixedarticle = $article;

/* Create array from word list (list from http://www.giwersworld.org/computers/linux/common-words.phtml) */
$wordlist = array_map( "rtrim", file( "wordlist.txt" ) );

/* Check each word in the article */
foreach ( $wordlist as $word ) {
$fixedarticle = str_ireplace( $word, "<strong>" . $word . "</strong>", $article );
}

echo $fixedarticle;[/PHP]

While I am getting some output now, it's just the original form contents without the new formatting applied. Can anyone tell me why?
Nov 15 '06 #5
lasc
2
i think you need smth like this
[PHP]/* Get the form contents */
$article = stripslashes($_POST[ "article" ]);
$wordlist=file("wordlist.txt" )
$fixedarticle='';
foreach ( $wordlist as $word ) {
if( $word==$article) $fixedarticle. = '<strong>'. $word . '</strong><br />';
else
$fixedarticle = . $word .'<br />' ;
}

echo $fixedarticle;[/PHP]
Nov 15 '06 #6

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