Alternative Syntax in PHP_PHP Tutorial

Alternative syntax in PHP

I took a look at the wordpress code today, and there are some rare php alternative syntaxes in it,

<?php else : ?>
		<div class="entry-content">
			<?php the_content( __( &#39;Continue reading <span class="meta-nav">→</span>&#39;, &#39;thebox&#39; ) ); ?>
			<?php wp_link_pages( array( &#39;before&#39; => &#39;<div class="page-links">&#39; . __( &#39;Pages:&#39;, &#39;thebox&#39; ), &#39;after&#39; => &#39;</div>&#39; ) ); ?>
		</div><!-- .entry-content -->
	<?php endif; ?>

Colon (:) is equivalent to the left curly bracket ({), endif is equivalent to the right curly bracket (});

Let’s give an example:

It’s a negative number

The above statement is equivalent to

It’s a negative number

What are the alternative syntaxes in PHP?
There are alternative syntaxes for flow control (including if, while, forforeach, switch) statements.

Basic form of alternative syntax:
Replace the left curly brace ({) with a colon (:), and replace the right curly brace (}) with endif;, endwhile;, endfor;, endforeach; and endswitch;

while alternative syntax:

Other alternative syntaxes can be derived by analogy.