What are the consequences of not understanding the basic principles of PHP file handling and relying solely on code snippets from forums?

If one does not understand the basic principles of PHP file handling and solely relies on code snippets from forums, they may encounter errors or security vulnerabilities in their code. It is important to have a solid understanding of how file handling works in PHP to ensure proper file manipulation and data security.

// Example code snippet demonstrating proper file handling in PHP

$file = 'example.txt';

// Open the file for reading
$handle = fopen($file, 'r');

// Check if the file was successfully opened
if ($handle) {
    // Read the contents of the file
    $contents = fread($handle, filesize($file));

    // Close the file
    fclose($handle);

    // Output the contents of the file
    echo $contents;
} else {
    echo 'Error opening the file.';
}