PHP Exercises: Create a new string using first two characters of a given string

Last update on May 28 2025 13:07:36 (UTC/GMT +8 hours)

62. First Two Characters Extraction

Write a PHP program to create a new string using first two characters of a given string. If the string length is less than 2 then return the original string.

Sample Solution:

PHP Code :

<?php
// Define a function named 'test' that extracts the first two characters of a string
function test($s1)
{
    // Check if the length of s1 is less than 2
    if (strlen($s1) < 2)
    {
        // If true, return s1 as is
        return $s1;
    }
    else
    {
        // If false, use substr to extract the first two characters of s1
        return substr($s1, 0, 2);
    }
}

// Test the 'test' function with different input strings and display the results
echo test("Hello")."\n";
echo test("Hi")."\n";
echo test("H")."\n";
echo test("  ")."\n";
?>

Explanation:

Function Definition:

The function test is defined to take one parameter, $s1, which is expected to be a string.

Length Check:

The function first checks if the length of $s1 is less than 2 using strlen($s1) < 2.

Return Logic:

If Length < 2:

If the length is less than 2, it returns $s1 as is (meaning the entire string, whether it's empty or a single character).

If Length ≥ 2:

If the length is 2 or more, it uses substr($s1, 0, 2) to extract the first two characters of the string and returns them.

Output:

He
Hi
H

Flowchart:

For more Practice: Solve these Related Problems:

Write a PHP script to output a new string using the first two characters of the input, reverting to the original if its length is below two.
Write a PHP function to conditionally extract the initial two letters from a string, handling short strings appropriately.
Write a PHP program to slice the first two characters, using a fallback to return the whole string if necessary.
Write a PHP script to check the length of a string and then either output the first two characters or the string itself.

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