[SOLVED] help with a basic php script

[parabolate]

Hey all,

 

I am new to this forum and brand new to php, never worked with it before.

 

I am trying to write a script that takes in 5 words from the user via a text box and then prints them out in reverse order. Also, I want to validate the input to make sure that only letters were provided as input - no numbers or characters (i.e. 1 2 3 & ! # + \ etc.).

 

So, if one two three four five was entered.....five four three two one would be printed.

 

Anyone have any tips they could offer a newb as to how to accomplish this? I've been browsing around the web for awhile now and haven't found anything that helps me out - everything I've come across thus far has been for more advanced scripts Hoping one of you knowledgeable folk can give me some more effective input!

 

Thanks!

[mikesta707]

the string reverse is pretty easy, just use the strrev function.

 

$string = "Hello World!";

$reverse = strrev($string);

 

As for the validation, you can accomplish that with regex. its a very simple regex expression match, but i'm awful with regex, so I don't want to give you something that is wrong

[Michdd]

<?php
//Store the value of the form element that has the name of "input" in a variable named $input
$input = $_POST['input'];
//Check to see if the string contains only letters (spaces are also allowed)
if(ctype_alpha(str_replace(' ', NULL, $input)))
{
//Split the string into an array of the different words
//Then reverse the order of the words in the array
//Finally reform the string separating each word with a space and echoing it
echo implode(' ', array_reverse(explode(' ', $input)));
}
else
{
//They entered non-alpha characters
echo 'You entered Invalid characters';
}
?>

 

Note: That doesn't check to make sure exactly 5 words were entered. But that would be easy to check for.