Why is this a parse error?

Question

The following code

$t =   1 – (1 - 2);

yields:

Parse error: syntax error, unexpected T_STRING on line 3 in php 5.2.3 and in 5.4 I get Parse error: in <file> on line 3

To me it seems like I'm subtracting one expression from another, which I would imagine is legal. Why is this a parse error?

Answer 1

The first "–" is an en-dash, but it should be a hyphen-minus like the latter one: "-". Replace it, and your code will work.