Question

What am I doing wrong?

$title = get_the_title();
$firstLetter = $title[0];
$title[0] = '<span class = "wrapBlue">' . $firstLetter . '</span>';     

echo $title; // comes out with weird switched around string?

get_the_title() is a wordpress function.

var_dump on $title gives a string of length 21.

var_dump on $firstLetter gives a string containing the correct character of length 1

Answer 1

As you know $title[0] refers to the first letter – but what you’re trying to assign isn’t a letter. Try something like this:

$title = '<span class = "wrapBlue">' . $firstLetter . '</span>' . substr($title, 1);