Checking if Any Item in Array is Found in a String - php

Question

I know this question has been asked before but I haven't been able to get the provided solutions to work.
I'm trying to check if the words in an array match any of the words (or part of the words) in a provided string.
I currently have the following code, but it only works for the very first word in the array. The rest of them always return false.
"input" would be the "haystack" and "value" would be the "needle"
function check($array) {
global $input;
foreach ($array as $value) {
if (strpos($input, $value) !== false) {
// value is found
return true;
} else {
return false;
}
}
}
Example:
$input = "There are three";
if (check(array("one","two","three")) !== false) {
echo 'This is true!';
}
In the above, a string of "There is one" returns as true, but strings of "There are two" or "There are three" both return false.
If a solution that doesn't involve having to use regular expressions could be used, that would be great. Thanks!

Answer 1

The problem here is that check always returns after the first item in $array. If a match is found, it returns false, if not, it returns true. After that return statement, the function is done with and the rest of the items will not be checked.
function check($array) {
global $input;
foreach($array as $value) {
if(strpos($input, $value) !== false) {
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
The function above only returns true when a match is found, or false when it has gone through all the values in $array.

Answer 2

strpos(); is totally wrong here, you should simply try
if ($input == $value) {
// ...
}
and via
if ($input === $value) { // there are THREE of them: =
// ...
}
you can even check if the TYPE of the variable is the same (string, integer, ...)
a more professional solution would be
in_array();
which checks for the existance of the key or the value.

Answer 3

The problem here is that you're breaking out of the function w the return statement..so u always cut out after the first comparison.

Answer 4

you should use in_array() to compare the array values.
function check($array) {
global $input;
foreach ($array as $value) {
if (in_array($value,$input))
{
echo "Match found";
return true;
}
else
{
echo "Match not found";
return false;
}
}
}

Answer 5

You're returning on each iteration of $array, so it will only run once. You could use stristr or strstr to check if $value exists in $input.
Something like this:
function check($array) {
global $input;
foreach ($array as $value) {
if (stristr($input, $value)) {
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
This will then loop through each element of the array and return true if a match is found, if not, after finishing looping it will return false.
If you need to check if each individual item exists in $input you'd have to do something a little bit different, something like:
function check($array) {
global $input;
$returnArr = array();
foreach ($array as $value) {
$returnArr[$value] = (stristr($input, $value)) ? true : false;
}
return $returnArr;
}
echo '<pre>'; var_dump(check($array, $input)); echo '</pre>';
// outputs
array(3) {
["one"]=>
bool(false)
["two"]=>
bool(false)
["three"]=>
bool(true)
}

Answer 6

The reason your code doesnt work, is because you are looping through the array, but you are not saving the results you are getting, so only the last result "counts".
In the following code I passed the results to a variable called $output:
function check($array) {
global $input;
$output = false;
foreach ($array as $value) {
if (strpos($input, $value) != false) {
// value is found
$output = true;
}
}
return $output;
}
and you can use it like so:
$input = "There are two";
$arr = array("one","two","three");
if(check($arr)) echo 'this is true!';