Limit character count on Master Page?

[flyboy2kvi]

language: php

Question: In regards to the master page, does anyone know how to limit the character count to only display 250 in Dreamweaver CS4?

[David_Powers]

What do you mean by "master page"? Are you trying to limit the number of characters that can be inserted into a text area? Or do you want to limit the number of characters displayed when retrieving a record from a database?

[flyboy2kvi]

I want to limit the number of characters displayed when retrieving a record from a database.

jeff

[Lawrence_Cramer]

Depends on what server language you are using. In CF it would be something like this...

<cfoutput>#Left(Recordset.FieldName, 250)#</cfoutput>

Lawrence   *Adobe Community Expert*
www.Cartweaver.com
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[flyboy2kvi]

I"m using php for my language.

[Albert S.]

Hi Flyboy,

Here is a link to look over the function:  http://us3.php.net/manual/en/function.substr.php

$string = $row_Recordset['dbfield'];

$output = substr($string, 0, 255);

echo $output;

[David_Powers]

Using substr() will definitely do it, but it will cut off the string at exactly the number of characters entered as the third argument. A more elegant way of doing it is to find the first space after 250 characters, and then add an elipsis like this:

$string = $row_recordsetName['fieldName'];
// get the first space after 250 characters
$space = strpos($string, ' ', 250);
// cut off the string at the space and add an ellipsis
echo substr($string, 0, $space) . '...';

[flyboy2kvi]

hmm, let me try. I will keep you posted.

[flyboy2kvi]

Ahh, it worked.  However, i did notice that if there are less than 250 characters in that database table an error message will appear on that line (see below).

• Mavs Win Big! - Update Me Here
  
  Warning: strpos() [function.strpos]: Offset not contained in string in C:\wamp\www\Articles-PHP\index.php on line 99
  ...
  

[David_Powers · Accepted solution]

That's easily fixed. Use this custom function instead:

function extractChars($text, $chars = 250) {
     if (strlen($text) < $chars) {
          return $text;
     } else {
          $pos = strpos($text, ' ', $chars);
          return substr($text, 0, $pos) . '...';
     }
}

Put that function definition in your page, and use it like this:

echo extractChars($row_recordsetName['fieldName']);

If the text is less than 250 characters, you'll just get the full text. If it's more than 250, you get the text shortened.

The function has an optional second argument, which determines the number of characters that you want to use as the limit. So, if you want only the first hundred, do this:

echo extractChars($row_recordsetName['fieldName'], 100);

[flyboy2kvi]

Sweet!

Thanks..