This function implements a comparison algorithm that orders alphanumeric strings in the way a human being would, this is described as a "natural ordering". An example of the difference between this algorithm and the regular computer string sorting algorithms (used in strcmp()) can be seen below:
$arr1 = $arr2 = array("img12.png","img10.png","img2.png","img1.png");
echo "Standard string comparison\n";
usort($arr1,"strcmp");
print_r($arr1);
echo "\nNatural order string comparison\n";
usort($arr2,"strnatcmp");
print_r($arr2);
|
Standard string comparison
Array
(
[0] => img1.png
[1] => img10.png
[2] => img12.png
[3] => img2.png
)
Natural order string comparison
Array
(
[0] => img1.png
[1] => img2.png
[2] => img10.png
[3] => img12.png
)
|
Similar to other string comparison functions, this one returns < 0 if str1 is less than str2; > 0 if str1 is greater than str2, and 0 if they are equal.
Note that this comparison is case sensitive.
See also ereg(), strcasecmp(), substr(), stristr(), strcmp(), strncmp(), strncasecmp(), strnatcasecmp(), strstr(), natsort() and natcasesort().