Winnipeg Web Design

Creating an Ellipsis in PHP

The following is a function that I use for when I need to create a sampling of text and I really like it. Some features it has is it only breaks at a space, and allows total customization of the max characters and the cut-off text. See the below:

Note: Thanks to RantingJerk for commenting on a neater version of the following then I previously had!

< ?php
function ellipsis($text, $max=100, $append='&hellip;')
{
	if (strlen($text) <= $max) return $text;
	$out = substr($text,0,$max);
	if (strpos($text,' ') === FALSE) return $out.$append;
	return preg_replace('/\w+$/','',$out).$append;
}
?>

This function can then be used in the following way:

< ?php
$text = "Pellentesque habitant morbi tristique senectus et netus et malesuada fames ac turpis egestas. Vestibulum tortor quam, feugiat vitae, ultricies eget, tempor sit amet, ante. Donec eu libero sit amet quam egestas semper. Aenean ultricies mi vitae est. Mauris placerat eleifend leo.";
echo ellipsis($text,100);
?>

I hope this little trick helps you speed up your development time! Have any utility functions you keep around? Comment Below or tweet me (@brenelz).

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Written by Brenley Dueck