striptags() Useless after htmlspecialchars()

Folks,

Is not this following code taught in tutorials ridiculous ?

“`
function test_input($data)
{
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data); //Strips only Backward Slashes. Not Forward Slashes.

**$data = htmlspecialchars($data);
$data = strip_tags($data);**

return $data;
}
“`

Note the 2 **asterisked** lines. In my opinion, either one line from the two bold lines should exist and not both.
Why ? Here’s why …

If the input is this:

[code]
$input_3 = ‘<a href=”http://www.url.com/index.php”>Link</a>’;
[/code]

Then this line is ignored:

[code]
$data = strip_tags($data);
[/code]

As the output is this:
**<a href=”http://www.url.com/index.php”>Link</a>**

If striptags() is ignored then what’s the use of having it after the line:

[code]
$data = htmlspecialchars($data);
[/code]

See my point ?

And so, the code must be either of the two:

[code]
<?php

function test_input($data)
{
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data); //Strips only Backward Slashes. Not Forward Slashes.

$data = htmlspecialchars($data);

return $data;
}

$input_3 = ‘<a href=”http://www.url.com/index.php”>Link</a>’;

echo test_input($input_3);

?>
[/code]

[code]
<?php

function test_input($data)
{
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data); //Strips only Backward Slashes. Not Forward Slashes.

$data = striptags($data);

return $data;
}

$input_3 = ‘<a href=”http://www.url.com/index.php”>Link</a>’;

echo test_input($input_3);

?>
[/code]

But not both, like this:

[code]
<?php

function test_input($data)
{
$data = trim($data);
$data = stripslashes($data); //Strips only Backward Slashes. Not Forward Slashes.

$data = htmlspecialchars($data);
$data = striptags($data);

return $data;
}

$input_2 = ‘http://www.url.com/index.php’;
$input_3 = ‘<a href=”http://www.url.com/index.php”>Link</a>’;

echo test_input($input_3);

?>
[/code]

Yes or no ?

Also in #PHP _↴