PHP | fgetc( ) Function

The fgetc() function in PHP is an inbuilt function which is used to return a single character from an open file. It is used to get a character from a given file pointer.

The file to be checked is used as a parameter to the fgetc() function and it returns a string containing a single character from the file which is used as a parameter.

Syntax:

fgetc($file)

Parameters: The fgetc() function in PHP accepts only one parameter $file. It specifies the file from which character is needed to be extracted.

Return Value: It returns a string containing a single character from the file which is used as a parameter.

Errors And Exception:

1. The function is not optimised for large files since it reads a single character at a time and it may take a lot of time to completely read a long file.
2. The buffer must be cleared if the fgetc() function is used multiple times.
3. The fgetc() function returns Boolean False but many times it happens that it returns a non-Boolean value which evaluates to False.

Below programs illustrate the fgetc() function.

Program 1: In the below program the file named gfg.txt contains the following text.

This is the first line.
This is the second line.
This is the third line.

<?php

// file is opened using fopen() function
$my_file = fopen("gfg.txt", "rw");

// Prints a single character from the
// opened file pointer
echo fgetc($my_file);

// file is closed using fclose() function
fclose($my_file);

?>

Output:

T

Program 2: In the below program the file named gfg.txt contains the following text.

This is the first line.
This is the second line.
This is the third line.

<?php

// file is opened using fopen() function
$my_file = fopen("gfg.txt", "rw");

// prints single character at a time
// until end of file is reached
while (! feof ($my_file))
  {
  echo fgetc($my_file);
  }

// file is closed using fclose() function
fclose($my_file);
?>

Output:

This is the first line.
This is the second line.
This is the third line.

Reference:
http://php.net/manual/en/function.fgetc.php