What are some best practices for handling decimal numbers in PHP to ensure consistency across different environments?

When working with decimal numbers in PHP, it is important to ensure consistency across different environments by using the appropriate functions for handling floating-point numbers. One common approach is to use the number_format() function to format decimal numbers with a consistent number of decimal places. Additionally, using type casting or the round() function can help avoid precision issues that may arise when performing calculations with decimal numbers.

// Example of formatting a decimal number with 2 decimal places
$number = 123.456789;
$formatted_number = number_format($number, 2);
echo $formatted_number; // Output: 123.46