Is there a shortcut to writing multiple conditions in php?

Question

Is there a shorter way of writing this (without using regex or string-matching functions)?

if($page=='page1.php' || $page=='page2.php' || $page=='page3.php' || $page=='page4.php'){ do something...}

I'm looking for something like:

if($page==('page1.php', 'page2.php', 'page3.php', 'page4.php')){do something...}

but I know that isn't correct. Any suggestions?

I'm assuming that the values aren't actually page1.php,page2.php etc and they are placeholders? Or is this actually what your code will be checking for? — MDEV
– MDEV, Commented Jan 18, 2012 at 22:26
yep...pretty close to a duplicate...I looked for 5 min and couldn't find a question similar to mine...so I posted it. — codescribblr
– codescribblr, Commented Jan 18, 2012 at 22:28
in any case, I think that as with the other one, in_array may well be the best solution — MDEV
– MDEV, Commented Jan 18, 2012 at 22:30
See the newest answer to the question Mario links to, on using associative array keys. in_array must search through the array looking for a match (O(n) time complexity), while looking up a string as a key rather than a value takes a constant time to lookup (O(1) time complexity). — outis
– outis, Commented Jan 19, 2012 at 10:43

dkamins · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-19 03:13:14Z

14

Try in_array:

if (in_array($page, array('page1.php', 'page2.php', 'page3.php'))) { ... }

http://php.net/manual/en/function.in-array.php

edited Jan 19, 2012 at 3:13

answered Jan 18, 2012 at 22:24

dkamins

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3 Comments

dkamins Over a year ago

Maybe I left out the last parens as an exercise for the reader.

codescribblr Over a year ago

well in that case, perfecto! ;)

Cave Johnson Over a year ago

I just wanted to add a note for posterity. PHP version 5.4+ has a new array syntax so this can be made even (slightly) shorter. Like this: if (in_array($page, ['page1.php', 'page2.php', 'page3.php'])) { ... }

dorsh · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-18 22:24:25Z

3

Use switch, more readable than a complex if condition

switch ($page){ case 'page1.php': case 'page2.php': case 'page3.php': case 'page4.php': // do something break; default: //else }

answered Jan 18, 2012 at 22:24

dorsh

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2 Comments

codescribblr Over a year ago

better...but still a little verbose. I'd like to try not to repeat any command more than once.

dorsh Over a year ago

I think any other option would be less efficient than an if or switch statement.

mario · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-18 22:37:54Z

To have an answer that is not same old same old:

if (preg_match('"^page[1-4]\.php$"', $page)) {

Now this makes sense for your synthetic example, and if you really have ranges of something to test against, or some other structure to go by. Mostly it just happens to be compacter then.

Please don't bug me with microoptimization conjectures if you haven't profiled even the hypothetical example.

Mikołaj Stolarski · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-18 22:26:48Z

I think one possible solutions is writing function that as arguments takes page1.php, page2.php etc. and return true if statement is correct.

Silvertiger · Accepted Answer · 2012-01-18 22:48:45Z

UPDATE

Sorry for the brain dead answer .. missed the first line. as stated above you could build an array of pages and user in_array()

$pagelist = array('page1.php','page2.php','page3.php','page4.php','page5.php') if (in_array($page,$pagelist)) { //do something }

it's a bit more elegant and definately cleans up the if statement, but doesn't do much to reduce the code. the only benefit i can think is that you could build the $pagelist array from an external source and using it might be more efficient?

you do realise he already has that exact code at the top of his post - thats what he's trying to avoid!

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