# Enable short tags

**URL:** <https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312>\
**Category:** Support\
**Created:** [April 27, 2017, 10:54am UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312 "2017-04-27T10:54:10Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![raison](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/raison/32/4445_2.png) [@raison](https://community.localwp.com/u/raison)\
**Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 10:54am UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312/1 "2017-04-27T10:54:10Z")

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Hi, I’m moving my dev sites over to local.

We use short tags in our development and this doesn’t work with local.

A short tag is \<?= or \<? instead of \<?php

This can be enabled in php.ini I believe by adding:

short\_open\_tag=On

Can you let us know how we can do this with local and if not if you can add this as a feature. Quite a critical one for me.

Elliot

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**Author:** ![raison](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/raison/32/4445_2.png) [@raison](https://community.localwp.com/u/raison)\
**Post date:** [April 27, 2017, 11:07am UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312/2 "2017-04-27T11:07:24Z")

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Answer.

- Head to /conf/php/
- Find PHP ver
- Amend short\_open\_tag = On

Voila!

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**Author:** ![scottbuscemi](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/scottbuscemi/32/24436_2.png) [@scottbuscemi](https://community.localwp.com/u/scottbuscemi)\
**Post date:** [December 19, 2017, 12:37am UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312/3 "2017-12-19T00:37:53Z")

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This really should be the default 😕

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**Author:** ![clay](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/clay/32/8248_2.png) [@clay](https://community.localwp.com/u/clay)\
**Post date:** [December 21, 2017, 9:57pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312/4 "2017-12-21T21:57:31Z")

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We’ll look into making this the default in a future version. Sorry for the trouble!

With that said, there is one benefit to this:

If you’re developing WordPress plugins/themes for distribution, having short tags disabled is a good way to make sure you’re not using them. Like this Local config, some hosts don’t have short tags enabled.

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**Author:** ![system](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex019/user_avatar/community.localwp.com/system/32/1_2.png) [@system](https://community.localwp.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [August 25, 2020, 6:31pm UTC](https://community.localwp.com/t/enable-short-tags/1312/5 "2020-08-25T18:31:47Z")

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