RE: [PHP] '<?=' History / Info request

Hey Lawrence et al- I understand what a short tag is : <? vs. <?php And I understand that <?= is essentially <? echo which indirectly makes <?= a short tag, right? Basically. That is not my question but rather it is involving the history of <?= in many ways, not just its relation with short tags -- that was only part of it. And the two are indeed related, indirectly. Btw, the reasoning of the relationship of <?= and <? as a short tag just hit me, I only heard this before but did not think of why. Anyway... So, I would appreciate someone who knows the history of this to report on my iniatial question and not explain the uses of the aforementioned tags. Fact of the matter is <?= has not always been available and I am wanting to know when it was "created" , and how or when I can use it so the entire world will understand and parse my code. And I suppose point out that it was not at all documented but that is already known by many. Thanks for the info though :-) We're just miscommunicating. Philip -- be outside the box. On Fri, 17 Nov 2000 Lawrence.Sheed@dfait-maeci.gc.ca wrote: > You are mixing 2 things Philip. > > <? ?> is short tag form for <?php ?> > > If you <?='dfdf';?> you are essentially putting code immediately after your > opening tag. > eg > <?echo 'stuff'?> > <?$a=$b?> > <?phpinfo()?> > are also all valid. > > This does not mean that there is suddenly a new command called <?= > its just that its parsing <?= to mean > Start PHP Code, echo whatever > > Note, if you use <?php ?> form, you must leave a space after the <?php, > because the parser has no way of knowing if you mean <?php or another > arbitrary tag. > > Always use <?php ?> form. If you have asp on your server as well, you could > use > > <?asp ?> > > <?php ?> > > as valid formats, if you used <? ?> form, then you won't know what parser is > running the code. (until it runs it with the wrong one and belches loudly > all over the web browser!). > > Cheers, > > Lawrence.