Internal error in WordPress/Sniffs/WP/PostsPerPageSniff.php

[anomiex]

Bug Description

This code fails if the $val is an empty string.

WordPress-Coding-Standards/WordPress/Sniffs/WP/PostsPerPageSniff.php

Line 81 in e02529f

$first_char = $val[0];

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 1 | ERROR | An error occurred during processing; checking has been aborted. The error message was: Uninitialized string offset 0 in /tmp/test/vendor/wp-coding-standards/wpcs/WordPress/Sniffs/WP/PostsPerPageSniff.php on line
   |       | 81 (Internal.Exception)
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Minimal Code Snippet

The issue happens when running this command:

vendor/bin/phpcs -s --standard=WordPress --sniffs=WordPress.WP.PostsPerPage test.php

... over a file containing this code:

<?php

$query = 'posts_per_page=' . (int) $_POST['limit'];

Error Code

WordPress.WP.PostsPerPage

Environment

Question	Answer
PHP version	8.2.10
PHP_CodeSniffer version	3.7.2
WordPressCS version	dev-develop e02529f, also tried with 3.0.1
PHPCSUtils version	1.0.8
PHPCSExtra version	1.1.1
WordPressCS install type	Composer project local
IDE (if relevant)	None

Additional Context (optional)

Tested Against develop Branch?

• I have verified the issue still exists in the develop branch of WordPressCS.

[jrfnl]

Thanks for reporting this @anomiex !