[PHP] Why is a '1' appearing after this script?

bigbrennan · 5th June 2008, 01:14 PM

I have a simple PHP banner rotation script, the contents of banner_1 and banner_2.php:

PHP Code:

  <a href="../../../../images/work/widgets.jpg" title="Blog widget and RSS up-to-the-minute feeds of the latest discussions and news from your blog or newsfeed, this application can be seeded in social media venues, downloadable from campaign websites meaning that you are delivering the news to them as it happens" class="style4" rel="lightbox">Widgets / Applications</a>

For some reason on the page a mysterious '1' appears from no where.

File source:

PHP Code:

 
              </table>
<?php
$banner_min = 1;
$banner_max = 2;
$random_banner_number = rand($banner_min, $banner_max);
echo include("banner_$random_banner_number.php");?>

              <table width="200" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="10" >

Page source:

PHP Code:

  </table>
<a href="../../../../images/work/widgets.jpg" title="Blog widget and RSS up-to-the-minute feeds of the latest discussions and news from your blog or newsfeed, this application can be seeded in social media venues, downloadable from campaign websites meaning that you are delivering the news to them as it happens" class="style4" rel="lightbox">Widgets / Applications</a>1     
              <table border="0" cellpadding="10" cellspacing="0" width="200">

What is generating that random '1'?

knapper · 5th June 2008, 02:07 PM

The rogue 1 is after your closing anchor tag on the last bit of page source, "Widgets / Applications</a>1"

bigbrennan · 5th June 2008, 02:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by knapper

The rogue 1 is after your closing anchor tag on the last bit of page source, "Widgets / Applications</a>1"

Sorry, don't think I explained my post that well.

The first snippet of code is what the PHP calls upon, the 2nd snippet is the PHP code and the thrid snipper it what is output to browser.

As you see in the first snipper there is no '1' but after the PHP has ran the '1' appears.

Any ideas?

bigbrennan · 5th June 2008, 02:30 PM

OK I have fixed it, not sure why but 'echo include' was messing it up. Replaced it with 'include' and it now works fine:

Before:

PHP Code:

  <?php

$banner_min = 1;

$banner_max = 2;

$random_banner_number = rand($banner_min, $banner_max);

echo include("banner_$random_banner_number.php");?>

After:

Before:

PHP Code:

  <?php

$banner_min = 1;

$banner_max = 2;

$random_banner_number = rand($banner_min, $banner_max);

include("banner_$random_banner_number.php");?>

knapper · 5th June 2008, 04:01 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigbrennan

OK I have fixed it, not sure why but 'echo include' was messing it up. Replaced it with 'include' and it now works fine:

The problem was in the initial version what you effectively had was this:

echo (so print out) include("banner_$random_banner_number.php");

What you wanted to do was not print out, but execute the function:

include("banner_$random_banner_number.php");

You dropped the echo function call and so PHP carries out the include function without interference.

Simon · 5th June 2008, 06:18 PM

the "include" function returns a boolean response true or false, when you echo true it is converted to a string and becomes the value 1

Alex. · 5th June 2008, 06:30 PM

Hey bigbrennan,
First off include() is the wrong function to be using here - it is intended for including and evaluating php code.
The proper function for doing what you're doing is file_get_contents(), which returns the contents of the specified contents as a string.

The link was being sent to the browser because it wasn't encapsulated in php tags.

The number 1 was being sent to the browser because by default include() returns true or false depending on whether the inclusion of the file was successful.
When you echo a boolean value, it is automatically converted to either 1 (true) or 0 (false).