HTML trapped inside echo statements #46
Description
I suggest the following code (taken from here):
<html>
<head>
<title>Suggestotron</title>
</head>
<body>
<?php
foreach ($topics as $topic) {
echo "<h3>" .$topic['title']. " (ID: " .$topic['id']. ")</h3>";
echo "<p>";
echo nl2br($topic['description']);
echo "</p>";
echo "<p>";
echo "<a href='/edit.php?id=" .$topic['id']. "'>Edit</a>";
echo " | ";
echo "<a href='/delete.php?id=" .$topic['id']. "'>Delete</a>";
echo "</p>";
}
?>
</body>
</html>
becomes like so:
<html>
<head>
<title>Suggestotron</title>
</head>
<body>
<?php foreach ($topics as $topic): ?>
<h3>
<?php echo $topic['title'] ?> (ID: <?php echo $topic['id'] ?>)
</h3>
<p>
<?php echo echo nl2br($topic['description']) ?>
</p>
<p>
<a href="/edit.php?id=<?php echo $topic['id'] ?>">Edit</a>
|
<a href="/delete.php?id=<?php echo $topic['id'] ?>">Edit</a>
</p>
<?php endforeach ?>
</body>
</html>
Reasoning: HTML should not be trapped inside echo statements. It prevents modern editors from syntax-checking the HTML or colourising it. Also, there's less need for concatenation, so it looks nicer.
Incidentally, I've swapped the brace-style foreach for a colon-style. There's a rule of thumb that the former belongs in code files and the colon-style is preferred in template files, because the ending is much more explicit. Not essential for this ticket but nice to add, IMO.
I expect there are others too, but it's worth raising a ticket to see if this is in keeping with house style first. Of course, htmlspecialchars() is required too, but that's another ticket.