Variables and Constants | PHP Tutorial

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The variable names in PHP must adhere to a few rules:

Variable Rules

1. Use the $ before a variable to denote it
2. A variable name should contain only alphabets [A-Z][a-z], digits [0-9], and the underscore (_) character
3. It should not start with a digit

Based on that here is an example of a PHP variable:

$name = "Abhinav";

Here are a few more examples of valid variable names:

$first_name = "Abhinav"; // a string variable
$_x = 123; // integer
$ghs_7_gGH____53945_ = "bla bla"; // string

echo $first_name . "<br>" . $_x . "<br>" . $ghs_7_gGH____53945_;

However, the following is an invalid variable:

$5name = "I am not valid";

Variable Naming Practices

1. Try to use meaningful variable names
2. Avoid using single character names like the following:

$c = 5;
$r = "manager";

Instead, it could be:

$person_count = 5;
$person_role = "manager";

The above style is an example of snake case variable names. You can also use camel case like:

$personCount = 5;
$personRole = "manager";

Try to stick to the same style while naming variables and functions to maintain consistency.

Variable Scope

Consider the following code snippet:

$count = 10;
echo $count;

function showCount() {
    $count = 20;
    echo $count;
}

showCount();
echo $count;

The output will be:

10
20
10

$count outside the function has a global scope, while the the $count inside the function has a local scope.

To access the global variable inside the function, use the global keyword:

$count = 10;
echo $count;

function showCount() {
    global $count;
    $count = 20;
    echo $count;
}

showCount();
echo $count;

Now the output will be:

10
20
20

Or you can also try the $GLOBALS array:

$count = 10;
echo $count;

function showCount() {
    echo $GLOBALS['count'];
}

showCount();
echo $count;

The output will be:

10
10
10

Static Variables

Static variables prove useful when you want to maintain a local variable’s even after the function has finished executing.

function increment() {
    static $count = 0;
    $count = $count + 1;
    echo $count . "<br>";
}
increment();
increment();

It will produce:

1
2

The assignment ($count = 0) gets executed only in the first function call.

PHP Constants

define('SITE_URL', 'https://codingreflections.com');
echo SITE_URL;

Things to note:

1. use the define() function to create a new constants
2. value of a constant cannot change
3. no need to prefix with $ sign
4. follows same naming rules as variables
5. however, it’s a common practice to use all caps for constants to distinguish from variables
6. constants have global scope, works inside and outside functions

The following will cause an error:

define('SITE_URL', 'https://codingreflections.com');
echo SITE_URL;

define('SITE_URL', 'https://example.com');

Constants have same value inside and outside functions.

define('SITE_URL', 'https://codingreflections.com');
echo SITE_URL;

function showUrl() {
    echo SITE_URL;
    define('ANOTHER_URL', 'https://example.com');
}

showUrl();
echo ANOTHER_URL;