What are some common pitfalls when dealing with leading zeros in PHP?

When dealing with leading zeros in PHP, a common pitfall is that PHP will interpret a number with leading zeros as an octal (base 8) number. This can lead to unexpected results, especially when performing calculations or comparisons. To avoid this issue, you can use functions like `intval()` or `sprintf()` to explicitly convert the number to decimal format without leading zeros. 

// Using intval() to convert a string with leading zeros to a decimal number
$number = "0123";
$decimalNumber = intval($number);
echo $decimalNumber; // Output: 123

// Using sprintf() to format a number with leading zeros
$number = 123;
$formattedNumber = sprintf("%d", $number);
echo $formattedNumber; // Output: 123

Keywords

leading zeros PHP string manipulation type juggling number formatting

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