PHPmaster.com has a new introductory tutorial for those just starting out with PHP (or with programming really) talking about using looping structures for sets of data - for, while/do-while and foreach.

A significant advantage of computers is that they can perform repetitive tasks easily and efficiently. Instead of writing repetitive code you can write a set of statements that processes some data and then have the computer execute them repeatedly by using a construct known as a loop. Loops come in several different flavors in PHP: for, while, do-while, and foreach. I'll introduce you to each of them and show you how they can making repetitive tasks straightforward and easy to maintain.

The tutorial explains a use case for each of the loop types and includes a bit of sample code showing how to put it into practice. It also shares two special keywords that can be used to bypass or break out of your current loop - break and continue.

Jani Hartikainen has posted about three simple, but hard to find, mistakes that can cause you endless frustration if you're not looking in the right places.

Here's his list:

• Semicolon after a while - a small problem with big (infinitely looping) consequences)
• empty() and magic __get method - __get will hit first, then empty
• Missing semicolon after break or continue - a classic that can make switches and evaluations difficult to debug

Comments on the post include a few others: working with variables by reference, comparisons with == versus === and strpos finding the first character in a string.