Special characters throwing off str_pad in php?

Question

I\'m writing a module that is supposed to be able to export transaction records in BankOne format.

Here is the specification of the format

Here is an example

Answer 1

function mb_str_pad($input, $pad_length, $pad_string = ' ', $pad_type = STR_PAD_RIGHT) {
    $diff = strlen($input) - mb_strlen($input,mb_detect_encoding($input));
    return str_pad($input, $pad_length + $diff, $pad_string, $pad_type);
}

Answer 2

This is happening because 'Ã' is a multi-byte character (4 bytes long), and str_pad is counting bytes rather than logical characters.

This is why you are missing three spaces, str_pad is counting 'Ã' as 4 single byte characters instead of one multi-byte one.

Try this function (credit here).

<?
function mb_str_pad( $input, $pad_length, $pad_string = ' ', $pad_type = STR_PAD_RIGHT)
{
    $diff = strlen( $input ) - mb_strlen( $input );
    return str_pad( $input, $pad_length + $diff, $pad_string, $pad_type );
}
?>

Answer 3

Using Gordon's solution you just have to add the encoding type to the mb_strlen and it will count the bytes correctly (at least it worked for me)

Here is the function I used:

function mb_str_pad( $input, $pad_length, $pad_string = ' ', $pad_type = STR_PAD_RIGHT, $encoding="UTF-8") {
    $diff = strlen( $input ) - mb_strlen($input, $encoding);
    return str_pad( $input, $pad_length + $diff, $pad_string, $pad_type );
}

Credit for the idea here