PHP: Using ? and :

[cburwell]

I have been looking around for what the use of ?, and : mean in PHP, such as in the following examples

$data = (file_exists($data)) ? $this->parse($data) : $data;

and

$func = ( $regType == 'P' ) ? 'preg_match' : 'ereg' . $case;

Could someone point me in the right direction of some documentation on this? I have tryed searching, but I can't seem to search for the uses of ? and : properly.

Thank you!

 

[Deleted member 65081]

It's an alternative conditional structure. It works much the same as your standard if/else/elsif. It looks like this;

$result = condition() ? true : false;

A more complete explination is in the PHP manual, about half way down this page.

 

[cburwell]

Thanks for the link and the explaination! I have to say the PHP documentation is probably some of the best documentation I have used.

 

[MadJuggla9]

those are ternary operators .... supposedly quicker, inline ..... 1 char .... just use if statements unless your going for obfuscation/hard-to-read-code, in which you can read a bit here (just a joyable read for nerds):

http://thc.segfault.net/root/phun/unmaintain.html