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How can I deturmine if a string contains any letters or numbers?

Hello.

How can I deturmine if a string contains any letters or numbers?

Right now I am using this:

if ($string != null) { echo "contains text"; }

But if the string has only spaces and new lines in it, the script returns "contains text"
I want it to do this only if there are letters or numbers in the string.

Thanks!

hernst42

You can try:

if (strlen(trim($string)) > 0) { echo "contains text.";}

trim removes any whitespace at the end and beginning of a string.

cLFlaVA

Try this:

if(ereg('[^A-Za-z0-9]', $string)){
echo "String must contain only letters and numbers.";
}else{
echo "$string has only letters and numbers.";
}

hankknight

ASKER

Thanks!

if (strlen(trim($string)) > 0) { echo "contains text.";}

would work exept if my string contains funny characters ( ., ?, *, ©, etc ) it would still pass the test.

The ereg option is closer:

if(ereg('[^A-Za-z0-9]', $string)){
echo "String must contain only letters and numbers.";
}else{
echo "$string has only letters and numbers.";
}

But this tells me if the string contains anything other than letters and numbers. I want to find out if the string contains at least one letter or one number.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

cLFlaVA

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