Function to Generate a PHP Random String of Numbers and Letters

Here’s a quick snippet of code that allows you to quickly generate a random string of letters and/or numbers based on the variables you feed into the function. (more…)

Working with Prices in PHP

Take an array of numbers, strip out the dollar sign and format them correctly.

This is useful when you are given prices as varchar or text with the dollar sign already included in the field. We’re going to start with an array of numbers, in this case we’ll use the array(‘$1256.45′,’$5564.75′,’$7895.33′).

Here is the foreach loop running:

Start with $1256.45
Strip the $ – 1256.45
Cleaned and formatted number with the dollar sign added back in as a character – $1,256.45

Start with $5564.75
Strip the $ – 5564.75
Cleaned and formatted number with the dollar sign added back in as a character – $5,564.75

Start with $7895.33
Strip the $ – 7895.33
Cleaned and formatted number with the dollar sign added back in as a character – $7,895.33

Here’s the code that performs the task above:

 <?php 
$number_array = array('$1256.45','$5564.75','$7895.33');

foreach ($number_array as $number) {
echo "Start with $number<br/>";
$number = str_replace('$','',$number);
echo "Strip the $ - $number<br/>";
$formatted_number = number_format($number, 2, '.',',');
echo "Cleaned and formatted number with the dollar sign added back in - <strong>$$formatted_number</strong><br/><br/>";
}
?>

Simple Percent off a Price Using PHP and Simple Math

The next thing we’ll do is take our newly formatted numbers and perform a simple calculation to get a percentage off.

We will use the price 1234.67 as our starting price and 45% off as the discount rate.

Here is the foreach loop running:

starting price is $1234.67
45% off of $1234.67 = $555.60
$1234.67 – $555.60 will equal $679.07 – the final sale price

 <?php
$price = 1234.67;
$percent_off = .45;
echo "starting price is $$price<br/>";
$money_off = $price * $percent_off;
$money_off = number_format($money_off, 2, '.',',');
echo "45% off of $$price = $$money_off<br/>";
$sale_price = $price - $money_off;
$sale_price = number_format($sale_price, 2, '.',',');
echo "$$price - $$money_off will equal $$sale_price - the final sale price";
?>