utf8_decode(3) [php man page]
UTF8_DECODE(3) 1 UTF8_DECODE(3) utf8_decode - Converts a string with ISO-8859-1 characters encoded with UTF-8 to single-byte ISO-8859-1 SYNOPSIS
string utf8_decode (string $data) DESCRIPTION
This function decodes $data, assumed to be UTF-8 encoded, to ISO-8859-1. PARAMETERS
o $data - An UTF-8 encoded string. RETURN VALUES
Returns the ISO-8859-1 translation of $data. SEE ALSO
utf8_encode(3) (contains an explanation of UTF-8 encoding). PHP Documentation Group UTF8_DECODE(3)
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UTF8_ENCODE(3) 1 UTF8_ENCODE(3) utf8_encode - Encodes an ISO-8859-1 string to UTF-8 SYNOPSIS
string utf8_encode (string $data) DESCRIPTION
This function encodes the string $data to UTF-8, and returns the encoded version. UTF-8 is a standard mechanism used by Unicode for encoding wide character values into a byte stream. UTF-8 is transparent to plain ASCII characters, is self-synchronized (meaning it is possible for a program to figure out where in the bytestream characters start) and can be used with normal string comparison functions for sorting and such. PHP encodes UTF-8 characters in up to four bytes, like this: UTF-8 encoding +------+-------------------------------------+---+ |bytes | | | | | | | | | bits | | | | | | | | representation | | | | | | +------+-------------------------------------+---+ | 1 | | | | | | | | | 7 | | | | | | | | 0bbbbbbb | | | | | | | 2 | | | | | | | | | 11 | | | | | | | | 110bbbbb 10bbbbbb | | | | | | | 3 | | | | | | | | | 16 | | | | | | | | 1110bbbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb | | | | | | | 4 | | | | | | | | | 21 | | | | | | | | 11110bbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb 10bbbbbb | | | | | | +------+-------------------------------------+---+ Each b represents a bit that can be used to store character data. PARAMETERS
o $data - An ISO-8859-1 string. RETURN VALUES
Returns the UTF-8 translation of $data. SEE ALSO
utf8_decode(3). PHP Documentation Group UTF8_ENCODE(3)