Open Source Web Development with LAMP: Using Linux, Apache, MySQL, Perl, and PHP

12.5. Language Syntax

Like the other languages we’ve studied (and most easy-to-use languages), PHP is whitespace-insensitive. Therefore, this statement:

<?  $title="PHP is cool";echo "<title> $title </title>"; ?> 

might be clearer if written as this:

<? 
    $title = "PHP is cool"; 
    echo "<title> $title </title>"; 
?> 

Variable names in PHP are case-sensitive—$a is different from $A. Function names (including user-defined functions) are case-insensitive—rose() is equivalent to ROSE() is equivalent to Rose().

As in C, C++, Java, and Perl, statements are terminated by a semicolon. Also as in C, C++, and Java (but not Perl), single-line bodies do not require the curly braces ({}), while multiline bodies do:

 <? // one-line bodies do not require the curlies, ...