Escape a string to be used as a shell argument

Program execution Functions
escapeshellcmd
Program execution Functions
PHP Manual

# escapeshellarg

(PHP 4 >= 4.0.3, PHP 5, PHP 7)

escapeshellarg — Escape a string to be used as a shell argument

### Description

string escapeshellarg ( string `$arg` )

escapeshellarg() adds single quotes around a string and quotes/escapes any existing single quotes allowing you to pass a string directly to a shell function and having it be treated as a single safe argument. This function should be used to escape individual arguments to shell functions coming from user input. The shell functions include exec(), system() and the backtick operator.

On Windows, escapeshellarg() instead removes percent signs, replaces double quotes with spaces and adds double quotes around the string.

### Parameters

`arg`

  The argument that will be escaped.

### Return Values

The escaped string.

### Examples

Example #1 escapeshellarg() example

`<?php
system('ls '.escapeshellarg($dir));
?>`

### See Also

- escapeshellcmd() - Escape shell metacharacters
- exec() - Execute an external program
- popen() - Opens process file pointer
- system() - Execute an external program and display the output
- backtick operator

Program execution Functions
escapeshellcmd
Program execution Functions
PHP Manual