Convert accented characters to their plain ascii equivalents

Question

I have to convert french characters into english on my php. I've used the following code:

iconv("utf-8", "ascii//TRANSLIT", $string);

But the result for ËËË was "E"E"E.

I don't need that double quote and other extra characters - I want to show an output like EEE. Is there any other method to convert french to english? Can you help me to do this?

Answer 1

The PHP Manual iconv Intro has a warning:

Note that the iconv function on some systems may not work as you expect. In such case, it'd be a good idea to install the GNU libiconv library. It will most likely end up with more consistent results.

But if accented characters are the only issue then you could use a dirty strtr (partially from strtr comments):

$string = 'Ë À Ì Â Í Ã Î Ä Ï Ç Ò È Ó É Ô Ê Õ Ö ê Ù ë Ú î Û ï Ü ô Ý õ â û ã ÿ ç';

$normalizeChars = array(
    'Š'=>'S', 'š'=>'s', 'Ð'=>'Dj','Ž'=>'Z', 'ž'=>'z', 'À'=>'A', 'Á'=>'A', 'Â'=>'A', 'Ã'=>'A', 'Ä'=>'A',
    'Å'=>'A', 'Æ'=>'A', 'Ç'=>'C', 'È'=>'E', 'É'=>'E', 'Ê'=>'E', 'Ë'=>'E', 'Ì'=>'I', 'Í'=>'I', 'Î'=>'I',
    'Ï'=>'I', 'Ñ'=>'N', 'Ń'=>'N', 'Ò'=>'O', 'Ó'=>'O', 'Ô'=>'O', 'Õ'=>'O', 'Ö'=>'O', 'Ø'=>'O', 'Ù'=>'U', 'Ú'=>'U',
    'Û'=>'U', 'Ü'=>'U', 'Ý'=>'Y', 'Þ'=>'B', 'ß'=>'Ss','à'=>'a', 'á'=>'a', 'â'=>'a', 'ã'=>'a', 'ä'=>'a',
    'å'=>'a', 'æ'=>'a', 'ç'=>'c', 'è'=>'e', 'é'=>'e', 'ê'=>'e', 'ë'=>'e', 'ì'=>'i', 'í'=>'i', 'î'=>'i',
    'ï'=>'i', 'ð'=>'o', 'ñ'=>'n', 'ń'=>'n', 'ò'=>'o', 'ó'=>'o', 'ô'=>'o', 'õ'=>'o', 'ö'=>'o', 'ø'=>'o', 'ù'=>'u',
    'ú'=>'u', 'û'=>'u', 'ü'=>'u', 'ý'=>'y', 'ý'=>'y', 'þ'=>'b', 'ÿ'=>'y', 'ƒ'=>'f',
    'ă'=>'a', 'î'=>'i', 'â'=>'a', 'ș'=>'s', 'ț'=>'t', 'Ă'=>'A', 'Î'=>'I', 'Â'=>'A', 'Ș'=>'S', 'Ț'=>'T',
);

//Output: E A I A I A I A I C O E O E O E O O e U e U i U i U o Y o a u a y c
echo strtr($string, $normalizeChars);