Question

I am new to PHP and trying to better understand the wordpress source code.
In my travels I have come across the following line of code…

$lastc = $data[$length-1];

Can anyone tell me what the purpose of the $length-1 is within the data array?

Answer 1

If we have an array:

$arr = array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5);

Then the $length, being count($arr), is 5. $data[$length – 1] is the last element (fourth index).

However, you’re right to note that this reads terribly. That’s why the developers should probably have just gone with:

$lastc = end($data);

Which returns the last element of an array.

If it is a string, they should use:

$lastc = substr($data, $length - 1);

Which would return the last character of the string.