replaceVariableByHTML

replaceVariableByHTML

TRIAL / ADVANCED / PREMIUM

Replaces a single variable by HTML.

Description
public replaceVariableByHTML (string $var, string $type, string $html [, array $options])

This method allows the insertion of HTML into a template. You may insert it as a "block", e.g. removing the corresponding paragraph and substituting it by the block of WordML, or "inline", e.g. just replacing the variable by inline WordML.

This method transforms HTML and CSS directly into WordML.

You may find a more detailed explanation of this useful method in the HTML to Word section of the API documentation.

To embed accents and other non-ASCII characters such as á or ü, and symbols such as ∞ or Ω, please check that the PHP Tidy extension and the PHP mbstring extension are installed and enabled.

To download images from remote URLs, please check that allow_url_fopen is enabled in the PHP config. If the remote images use HTTPS, please check that PHP is using a valid certification file and the SSL configuration is correct: More information.

Parameters

var

The template variable to be replaced by the HTML content.

type

The substitution type, it can be:

  • "block": the variable, together with its containing paragraph, is replaced by the HTML content.
  • "inline": only the variable is replaced by the inline HTML content.

html

The HTML code to be translated into WordML: it can be a string or the path to a file.

options

The possible keys and values are:

Key Type Description
addDefaultStyles bool True as default, if false prevents adding default styles when strictWordStyles is false.
baseURL string The base URL used to complete the relative paths of links and images.
cssEntityDecode bool If true uses html_entity_decode to parse CSS, useful when using font families with non-ASCII names.
customListStyles bool If true checks if there is a custom list style with that name and uses it.
disableWrapValue bool If true disable using a wrap value with Tidy to prevent extra blank spaces. Default as false.
downloadImages bool If true inserts the images into the DOCX document, otherwise just links them as an external source.
embedFonts bool If true downloads and embeds TTF fonts from @font-face rules. False as default. Only available in Premium licenses.
filter string Only renders the filtered contents. It could be an string denoting an id ('#myId'), a class ('.myClass'), a HTML tag or a valid XPath expression ('//expression').
firstMatch boolean If the variable appears more than once within the Word document and firstMatch is set to true, phpdocx will only replace the first occurrence of the variable within the Word document.
forceNotTidy bool False as default. If true, avoid using Tidy. Only recommended if Tidy can't be installed.
generateCustomListStyles bool If true generates automatically the custom list styles from the list styles (decimal, lower-alpha, lower-latin, lower-roman, upper-alpha, upper-latin, upper-roman).
isFile bool True for files and false for strings.
parseAnchors bool If true parses the anchors included in the HTML code.
parseCSSVars bool If true parses CSS variables.
parseDivs string paragraph or table. By default the method parses the div elements as containers.
parseFloats bool If true preserves the floating properties of images and tables.
removeLineBreaks bool If true removes extra line breaks that can be generated when transforming HTML that includes strings without a parent tag.
streamContext resource Stream context to download images.
strictWordStyles bool If true ignores almost all CSS styles and uses the styles set via the wordStyles option (see next).
stylesReplacementType string

Empty as default.

  • usePlaceholderStyles: keeps placeholder styles, styles from the imported HTML are ignored. Applies to the following styles: pPr, rPr.
  • mixPlaceholderStyles: mixes placeholder styles, placeholder styles overwrite HTML styles with the same name. Applies to the following styles: pPr, rPr.

Only available in Premium licenses.

stylesReplacementTypeIgnore array

Styles to be ignored from the imported HTML. Use with mixPlaceholderStyles. Empty as default.

Only available in Premium licenses.

stylesReplacementTypeOverwrite bool

If true, HTML styles overwrite placeholder styles with the same name that are not set in the stylesReplacementTypeIgnore option. Use with mixPlaceholderStyles. Default as false.

Only available in Premium licenses.

target string Possible values are: document (default), header, footer, footnote, endnote, comment. This option sets the scope of the replacement procedure.
useHTMLExtended bool If true allows using HTML Extended tags. False as default. Only available in Premium licenses.
wordStyles array One may associate different Word styles to HTML classes, ids or tags.
For example:
  • array(".myClass" => "LightGridPHPDOCX", "#myId" => "LightListAccent6PHPDOCX", "" => "PHPDOCXHeading").
Exceptions

PHP Tidy is not available and forceNotTidy is false.

Code samples

Example #1

The resulting Word document looks like:

Release notes
  • phpdocx 15.5:
    • extra check to avoid a PHP notice when using an invalid text align value.
    • removed @ (shut-up) operator to get list ids and table sizes.
    • improved adding ordered lists as sublists when the list type is autodetected.
  • phpdocx 15.0:
    • CSS variables.
    • WebP images.
    • max-width and max-height styles in images (CSS Extended).
    • alt attribute as descr value in images.
    • streamContext option to set a stream context to download images.
    • root and only-child selectors.
    • improved CSS media query handling.
    • CSS 8-digit HEX colors added as 6-digit HEX colors.
    • removed a PHP Warning when adding an invalid border color.
    • streamContext option.
    • default HTML content when adding an empty content.
    • reordered extended tags with the parseFloats option enabled to avoid an error message using an outdated version of MS Word 2007.
  • phpdocx 14.5:
    • improved line breaks between input tags.
    • stylesReplacementType allow paragraphs with empty styles (HTML Extended).
    • phpdocx_pagenumber supported as inline content (HTML Extended).
    • removed a mb_convert_encoding deprecated message when transforming HTML with PHP 8.2 or newer.
  • phpdocx 14.0:
    • autofit as table-layout style.
    • white-space noWrap in cells.
    • multiple text-decoration styles to the same content.
    • style "data-outline-level: none" for headings (CSS Extended).
    • 	 to add tabs (HTML Extended).
    • style "data-fit-text" for cell contents (CSS Extended).
    • phpdocx_ole (HTML Extended).
    • mark styles in phpdocx_endnote and phpdocx_footnote tags (HTML Extended).
    • pStyle and rStyle attributes in phpdocx_comment, phpdocx_endnote and phpdocx_footnote tags (HTML Extended).
  • phpdocx 13.5:
    • inches and cms to set image sizes.
    • improved comments, endnotes and footnotes as inline contents (HTML Extended).
    • data-type attribute (HTML Extended).
    • multiple comments, endnotes and footes in the same content (HTML Extended).
    • phpdocx_citation and phpdocx_bibliography net tags (HTML Extended).
    • improved working with list override styles as sublevels (HTML Extended).
    • empty paragraph added as default in empty cells includes a default spacing style.
    • stylesReplacementTypeOverwrite option.
  • phpdocx 13.0:
    • "~" selector.
    • "data-font-size: initial" style (CSS Extended).
    • improved br tags when being added before list tags.
    • new issets when reading CSS styles.
    • check images without a src attribute to avoid a PHP Warning using PHP 8.
    • hide PHP warnings shown by specific custom error levels when no standard tags are used with PHP DOM loadHTML.
  • phpdocx 12.5:
    • a tags wrapping images add hyperlink element (hlinkClick) to the image.
    • mix standard HTML tags and HTML Extended tags (HTML Extended).
    • replace 0xa0 characters by blank spaces (HTML Extended).
    • data-highlight style (CSS Extended).
    • static variable (HTML2WordML::$scaleImageFactor) to customize the default scale factor when adding images (7200 as default).
  • phpdocx 12.0:
    • no direction style set as default.
    • descr default value when adding base64 images to avoid a PHP warning with PHP 8.
    • improved parseAnchors option when the anchor tag is not added in a paragraph.
    • float casting to sizes to avoid a warning when using PHP 8 and not valid values.
  • phpdocx 11.0:
    • new HTML API: more than 90 new supported tags, attributes and styles.
    • CSS Extended.
    • SVG support to add images as URL, base64 and using svg tags.
    • mixPlaceholderStyles option (HTML Extended).
    • block contents embedded in other tags (HTML Extended).
    • phpdocx_onlinevideo tag (HTML Extended).
    • transform HTML tabs (	) (HTML Extended).
    • MathML equations.
    • changed the order of \n and \r\n using the removeLineBreaks option.
    • set 9999999999 as default wrap value when using Tidy to prevent Tidy versions not working correctly with 0 value to avoid extra blank spaces.
    • lists with and without custom list styles can be added at the same time when setting customListStyles as true.
    • DefaultParagraphFontPHPDOCX as default rStyle when generating links.
    • limited numId values in lists to 32767 to support restrictions from the new MS Word revisions.
    • extra check to get the correct image type when working with image streams.
  • phpdocx 10.0:
    • addBaseCSS method (HTML Extended).
    • stylesReplacementType option (HTML Extended).
    • supported overwriting styles in level lists (HTML Extended).
    • HTML tabs ( ) (HTML Extended).
    • set targets to tag contents (HTML Extended).
    • do not use a temp folder when adding an image with PHP 5.4 or newer.
    • clean gridCol 0 values, tables with not all widths set can be used.
    • cssEntityDecode option.
    • forceNotTidy option.
    • supported applying custom list styles to ol tags.
  • phpdocx 9.5:
    • padding-left and padding-right styles for table cell margins.
    • run-of-text styles for checkboxes and radio buttons.
    • supported font-weight 700, 800 and 900 as bold values.
    • supported custom character styles in span tags.
    • supported text-align in run-of-text styles.
  • phpdocx 9.0:
    • HTML Extended.
    • performance improvements.
    • supported custom paragraph styles in li tags.
    • supported start attribute in ol tags.
    • removed PHP notices using PHP 7.2 or newer.
    • removed the Font_Metrics error when using not valid fonts.
    • disableWrapValue option.
    • extra check to detect the image file extension.
    • static wordML variable in HTML2WordML has been replaced by a protected variable.
  • phpdocx 8.5:
    • generateCustomListStyles option.
    • base64 images.
    • downloadImages option as true by default.
    • replaced the create_function function if PHP 5.3 or newer. Replaced by an anonymous function.
  • phpdocx 8.0:
    • nth-child, nth-of-type, first-of-type and last-of-type selectors.
    • figcaption tag.
    • color and width for hr, margin-left and margin-right for td, auto and fixed for table-layout styles.
    • removeLineBreaks and addDefaultStyles options.
  • phpdocx 7.5:
    • supported stream images.
    • improved tables with colspan or rowspan values.
  • phpdocx 7.0:
    • supported RTL in lists.
  • phpdocx 6.5:
    • performance improvements.