[SOLVED] strange characters � from fread()

[countdrac]

hi

 

for some reason when i use "include" for displaying a file in my page everythings perfect

 

but now im using ajax so the "displayFile.php" which is where i use fread for an entire file and save it into a variable and send back to the javascript function to display has some of the characters - mostly singe quotes  '  appearing as �

 

is there a way to fix this? is this a problem with my file or fread?

 

 

the code for the fread is...

 

   $fileName = $_GET["q"];
   $file=fopen($fileName,"r");
   $result = fread($file, filesize($fileName));
   fclose($file);
   echo $result;

 

then the javscript where its sent to...

if (xmlHttp.readyState==4)
{ 
	document.getElementById('displayDoc').innerHTML = xmlHttp.responseText;
        }

 

thanks

[rajivgonsalves]

you should use file_get_contents instead of fread If I am not mistaken fread print directly to the output buffer not sure tho

 

[cooldude832]

you should use file_get_contents instead of fread If I am not mistaken fread print directly to the output buffer not sure tho

 

 

file_get_contents is only in php4.3 or greater, but that isn't the issue.

 

its whitespace in the file being opened

[rajivgonsalves]

yeah its binary safe  fread sorry for the confusion

[countdrac]

hi

thanks for the help

so i tried first:

$result = preg_replace('/\s\s+/',' ',$result);

and

$result = preg_replace('  ',' ',$result);

 

which just crashed and returns nothing

 

then i tried string replace which even when i tried

$result = str_replace('  ',' ',$result);

 

which as a function works and does what it supposed to... but doesnt get rid of the � characters...

 

besides all that like i said i think that they are certain: single quotations, double quotations and dashes in the file

 

im still kinda new to php so any help would be helpful... what do you recommend the best way to to fix this is?

 

thanks

 

[effigy]

You may need to display this in UTF-8:

 

<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" />

[countdrac]

ye i tried to stick that in the header... didnt help

[cooldude832]

lets try and nullify them instead of removing them.  Try and isolate their location in the included file and remove them.

[countdrac]

do you mean physically go into the included file? i have like 50 files...

 

how do i isolate what that � is? ive been trying but i cant figure out how to do it...

[effigy]

Do you know the encoding of the source? I'm guessing it's Windows-1252 because it uses "smart quotes" that err in UTF-8 when they are not converted properly.

[rajivgonsalves]

well save it to a file an check it in editplus or textpad you'll know the exact code that is returning you the block

[cooldude832]

my point is if you can isolate one you might learn something about the issue

[countdrac]

ok cool

so i got textpad and it seems they for sure something different...

 

when i highlight the wierd character the code comes up:

0x92, 0x93, 0x94 and 0x97 (depending on which i go over)

 

from a couple of files ive looked at these are the ones that are giving problems..... im not sure if there are others at this point...

 

what are they and how can i isolate them in a string replace (-or whatever)

 

thanks

[effigy]

After you've read in the data, you can use iconv to convert from Windows-1252 => UTF-8.

[countdrac]

Thanks

did the job!

 

$result = iconv("WINDOWS-1250","UTF-8",$result);