How can I combine strip_tags and substr ?

[hodja451]

I want to strip tags and return the first x characters. Every combo I try fails.

The code below is where I'm at. It works perfectly stripping the tags, it fails when I try to add substr to limit the length. Not that it should matter, but this is within an Oscommerce setup.

else {
              $lc_text = '&nbsp;<big><a href="' . tep_href_link(FILENAME_PRODUCT_INFO, ($cPath ? 'cPath=' . $cPath . '&' : '') . 'products_id=' . $listing['products_id']) . '">' . $listing['products_name'] . '</big></a>&nbsp;<br><br>' . strip_tags($listing['products_description'], '<br>') . '<a href="' . tep_href_link(FILENAME_PRODUCT_INFO, ($cPath ? 'cPath=' . $cPath . '&' : '') . 'products_id=' . $listing['products_id']) . '">' . '<strong><font color="#36C426">(...more)</font></strong></big></a>' . '&nbsp;';
            }

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Walter

[kovik]

You are not using substr at all in that code...

However...

function buildBriefDescription($description, $length = 100) {
    if (strlen($description) > $length) {
        $description = strip_tags($description);
        return substr($description, 0, $length) . '...';
    }
    return $description;
}

[hodja451]

Thanks for the reply!

I wasn't using substr, because however I placed it, I broke the code, I needed to know how to place it.

I worked on this for hours before asking, then I found the solution 5 minutes after asking.

I just changed

strip_tags($listing['products_description'], '<br>')

to

substr(strip_tags($listing['products_description'], '<br>'), 0, 100)