Bilge

Yes, and trim() has sorted it out. Thank you for your help

Thank you for your response. Yes var_dump does reveal a difference. print_r(var_dump($text[2])) produces: string(8) "charlie with the second " on a new line print_r(var_dump($word)) produces: string(7) "charlie"

In the following code: echo $text[2] returns the word at that index but echo $key returns a blank. Can someone explain why is array-search not working in this indexed array? It does work when I test it with a key => value type array. <?php $myfile = fopen("test.txt", "r") or die("Unable to open file!"); while(!feof($myfile)) { $text[] = fgets($myfile); } fclose($myfile); $word = $_POST['word']; $key = array_search($word, $text); echo $key ?>