What are best practices for handling mathematical operations in PHP scripts?

When handling mathematical operations in PHP scripts, it is important to ensure proper data validation and error handling to prevent unexpected results or vulnerabilities. It is recommended to use built-in PHP functions for mathematical operations, such as `intval()` for integer conversion and `is_numeric()` for checking numeric values. Additionally, consider using type casting to ensure consistent data types in calculations.

// Example of handling mathematical operations in PHP scripts

// Validate input data
$number1 = isset($_POST['number1']) && is_numeric($_POST['number1']) ? intval($_POST['number1']) : 0;
$number2 = isset($_POST['number2']) && is_numeric($_POST['number2']) ? intval($_POST['number2']) : 0;

// Perform mathematical operation
$result = $number1 + $number2;

// Output the result
echo "Result: " . $result;