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phppreg-match

php preg_match no result without echo

I'm trying to scrape some data from PDF files. I'm using class.pdf2text.php (found here) for that (with some in-house adjustments), all works fine, but I have this very strange situation. If I run the code like this:

$a = new PDF2Text();
$a->setFilename('invoiceView2.pdf'); 
$a->decodePDF();
$pdftxt=$a->output();
preg_match("/Generated on.*/",$pdftxt,$bill_date);
var_dump($bill_date);
die();

nothing is returned $bill_date is null. If I run the code like this:

$a = new PDF2Text();
$a->setFilename('invoiceView2.pdf'); 
$a->decodePDF();
$pdftxt=$a->output();
echo $pdftxt;
preg_match("/Generated on.*/",$pdftxt,$bill_date);
var_dump($bill_date);
die();

Then all the content of $pdftxt is printed, and the $bill_date is an array containing the result of the preg_match. As you can imagine I have no intention of outputting the whole content, I only need to get the preg_match result...

What I'm missing here?

Solution

  • Off.... the class class.pdf2text.php had an attempt to show progress of decoding the text which called a flush(); ob_flush(); which off course made the things go south... Always triple check the code of whatever class/addon you use if it is not your own.