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Booleans

This is the easiest type. A boolean expresses a truth value. It can be either TRUE or FALSE.

Note: The boolean type was introduced in PHP 4.

Syntax

To specify a boolean literal, use either the keyword TRUE or FALSE. Both are case-insensitive.


<?php
$foo = True; // assign the value TRUE to $foo
?>

Usually you use some kind of operator which returns a boolean value, and then pass it on to a control structure.


<?php
// == is an operator which test
// equality and returns a boolean
if ($action == "show_version") {
    echo "The version is 1.23";
}

// this is not necessary...
if ($show_separators == TRUE) {
    echo "<hr>\n";
}

// ...because you can simply type
if ($show_separators) {
    echo "<hr>\n";
}
?>

To explicitly convert a value to boolean, use either the (bool) or the (boolean) cast. However, in most cases you do not need to use the cast, since a value will be automatically converted if an operator, function or control structure requires a boolean argument.

See also Type Juggling.

When converting to boolean, the following values are considered FALSE:

the boolean FALSE itself
the integer 0 (zero)
the float 0.0 (zero)
the empty string, and the string "0"
an array with zero elements
an object with zero member variables
the special type NULL (including unset variables)

Every other value is considered TRUE (including any resource).

Warning

-1 is considered TRUE, like any other non-zero (whether negative or positive) number!


<?php
var_dump((bool) "");        // bool(false)
var_dump((bool) 1);         // bool(true)
var_dump((bool) -2);        // bool(true)
var_dump((bool) "foo");     // bool(true)
var_dump((bool) 2.3e5);     // bool(true)
var_dump((bool) array(12)); // bool(true)
var_dump((bool) array());   // bool(false)
var_dump((bool) "false");   // bool(true)
?>

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Booleans

Syntax

Converting to boolean