php fopen is returning boolean TRUE

Question

Here's a tiny section of php code:

if(file_exists('question.txt')) print("File exists<br>");
else print("File does not exist<br>");
$handle = fopen('question.txt', 'r') || die("Cannot open file");
print("fopen returns handle=[$handle]");
fclose($handle);
die("all done");

The result is

File exists
fopen returns handle=[1]
( ! ) Warning: fclose() expects parameter 1 to be resource, bool given in C:\wamp64\www\htdocs\NewCompany\ProofOfLearn\Development\test.php on line 6
Call Stack
#   Time    Memory  Function    Location
1   0.0002  362584  {main}( )   ...\test.php:0
2   0.0003  362696  fclose( $fp = TRUE )    ...\test.php:6
all done

In other words, fopen is returning TRUE, which is impossible

Of all the logs, only php.error.log shows an error, and it doesn't help

[16-Feb-2022 03:00:52 UTC] PHP Warning:  fclose() expects parameter 1 to be resource, bool given in C:\wamp64\www\htdocs\NewCompany\ProofOfLearn\Development\test.php on line 6
[16-Feb-2022 03:00:52 UTC] PHP Stack trace:
[16-Feb-2022 03:00:52 UTC] PHP   1. {main}() C:\wamp64\www\htdocs\NewCompany\ProofOfLearn\Development\test.php:0
[16-Feb-2022 03:00:52 UTC] PHP   2. fclose($fp = TRUE) C:\wamp64\www\htdocs\NewCompany\ProofOfLearn\Development\test.php:6

And unlike many newbies with questions, I've been programming for 66 years, and this is the first time I've been stumped.

Answer 1

This is happening because you are actually assigning $handle to the full result of your "OR" statement:

$handle = fopen('question.txt', 'r') || die("Cannot open file");
          \___________________________________________________/

Your $handle variable isn't just being assigned to the result of fopen, rather it's getting the boolean value of foo || bar. Make sense?

You need to assign the return value from fopen on its own, perhaps like this:

if(!$handle = fopen('question.txt', 'r')) {
    die("Cannot open file");
}