I am developing my own blog engine, and one of the features I need is a Code Blocks filter, so I can paste HTML c#, PHP, and other codes onto the page. Any suggestions for how I program a filter that does this? How does the HMS code block work?

I'm not the greatest programmer in the world, but it's my understanding that most (if not all) languages already come with components/classes/whatever that will do this for you...... so you probably won't have to code a filter from scratch.

Another easy solution would be to just scan the users' input for bracket characters (square, parenthesis, angled, curly)... removing them should render any code useless. (Feel free to prove me wrong though... I'm still learning this stuff).

If you are looking to provide sample code, I would reccomend replacing < and > with %lt; and &gt;. You can then replace (for example) [phpcode] and [/phpcode] with <div class="php"> and </div>. A utility such as Chili will help code highlighting.

Chili: http://noteslog.com/personal/projects/chili/1.8c/

Thanks

If you're using PHP try this one on for size:

http://pear.php.net/package/Text_Highlighter

I was thinking of doing the same thing, but problems arise (especially with php) where you might have perfectly valid HTML inside of your code, which is then rendered anywhere you print out that code.

I'm hoping this Pear package is going to alleviate some of those headaches.