PHP Function running locally but not within a loop - php

Question

I have this function and statements running fine in my page:
$name = "JÜRGEN RÜDIGER HERMANN";
function nameReplace($name)
{
$name = str_replace("Ñ", "N", $name);
$name = str_replace("Ü", "U", $name);
$name = str_replace("Ç", "C", $name);
$name = str_replace("Á", "A", $name);
$name = str_replace("É", "E", $name);
return $name;
}
$name = nameReplace($name);
echo "This is the name!" . $name . "<br>";
$orename = "ÑÜÇÁÉ";
$orename = nameReplace($orename);
echo "Forename test: " . $orename . "<br>";
$astname = "ÁÉÑÜÇ";
$astname = nameReplace($astname);
echo "Lastname test: " . $astname . "<br>";
Everything about works fine, the characters are changed to acceptable characters for upload into a progress DB. But later in the page I'm looping through data and taking strings from a parsed HTML file:
$familyname = nameReplace($familyname);
The above familyname nameReplace() fails. If I echo out just family name it echoes out the string. If I echo out nameReplace($familyname) it returns blank or false.
Any ideas? Do functions have a specific scope?
Thanks,
Stephen.
Below is the code for the loop as requested:
for($i=1;$i<41;$i++)
{
$textfile = 'interpol_create' . $i. '_' . $date . '.txt';
$myfile = fopen($textfile, "r") or die("Unable to open file!");
if($myfile)
{
#read through the file line by line
while (($buffer = fgets($myfile, 4096)) !== false)
{
$linenumber++;
if( (strstr($buffer, '<span')) && (strstr($buffer, 'titre')))
{
$buffer = str_replace('<br />', '|', $buffer);
#echo $buffer . '<br>';
$result = explode('|', $buffer);
#family name variable
$familyname = $result[0];
$familyname = str_replace('<span class="titre">', '', $familyname);
$familyname = trim($familyname);
$familyname = nameReplace($familyname);
#first name variable
$forename = $result[1];
$forename = nameReplace($forename);
if(strstr($forename, "RGEN"))
{
echo "Forename is ".nameReplace((string)$forename)."<br>";
$newVar = "JÜRGEN RÜDIGER";
$newVar = nameReplace($newVar) . "<br>";
echo "New variable = " . $newVar . "<br>";
}
$forename = str_replace("</span>", "", $forename);
$forename = trim($forename);
#echo ($namecounter + 1) . ' | ';
#echo 'Family name : ' . $familyname . ' | Forename is : ' . $forename . '<br>';
$update_full_file .= $forename . " " . $familyname;
$firstnames[$namecounter] = $forename;
$lastnames[$namecounter] = $familyname;
}#end of if strstr $buffer
if( (strstr($buffer, 'Age today :')) && (strstr($buffer, '<br')))
{
$buffer = str_replace('<br />', '', $buffer);
$buffer = str_replace('Age today :', '', $buffer);
$agetoday = $buffer;
$agetoday = str_replace("<br/>", "", $agetoday);
$agetoday = trim($agetoday);
#echo 'Age Today : ' . $agetoday . '<br>';
$ages[$namecounter] = $agetoday;
$update_full_file .= ",," . $agetoday;
$nextlinenumber = $linenumber + 2;
$nationalitylinenumbers[$namecounter] = $nextlinenumber;
#echo $nationcounter . " " . $nextlinenumber . '<br>';
}
if( (strstr($buffer, 'Nationality :')) )
{
#$buffer = str_replace('<br />', '', $buffer);
#$buffer = str_replace('Age today :', '', $buffer);
#echo 'Nationality : ' . $buffer . '<br>';
#echo 'Line number : ' . $linenumber . '<br>';
}
if( in_array($linenumber, $nationalitylinenumbers) )
{
#echo $nationcounter . $buffer . '<br>';
#$nationcounter++;
}
###does the current linenumber appear in the array $nationalitylinenumbers?###
if( in_array($linenumber, $nationalitylinenumbers) )
{
$nation = $buffer;
$nation = str_replace("<br/>", "", $nation);
$nation = str_replace("</div>", "", $nation);
$nation = str_replace(" ", "", $nation);
#$nation = str_replace(",", "", $nation);
$nation = str_replace('<divclass="sep">', 'No Country', $nation);
$nation = trim($nation);
if(strstr($nation, ','))
{
#echo 'Create a duplicate entry';
$nations = explode(',', $nation);
$nation = $nations[0];
$nation = trim($nation);
$duplicateNation = $nations[1];
$duplicates[$duplicate_counter] .= $forename . " " .$familyname . ",," . $agetoday . ",,,,,". trim($duplicateNation) .",,,,,\n";
$duplicate_counter++;
}
#$nation = countryMappings($nation);
###check to see if entry has 2 countries###
#echo $nationcounter . $nation . '<br>';
$nationcounter++;
$update_full_file .= ",,,,," .$nation. ",,,,,\n";
$nationalitys[$namecounter] = $nation;
#echo $buffer.'<br>';
$namecounter++;
}
}#end of while buffer = fgets
}#end of if myfile
}

Answer 1

I managed to fix this!
The issue was I was translating the wrong data. I parsed in the 'Ü' character and was using:
$name = str_replace("Ü", "U", $name);
I exported the data to a text file and found that the character is actually exporting as Ãœ instead of Ü. I amended my function to be as below and it now works:
$name = str_replace("Ü", "U", $name);
Thanks again to all who responded, all the tips were very helpful.