PHP not have a function for XML-safe entity decode? Not have some xml_entity_decode?

Question

THE PROBLEM: I need a XML file \"full encoded\" by UTF8; that is, with no entity representing symbols, all symbols enconded by UTF8, except the only 3 ones that are

Answer 1

For those coming here because your numeric entity in the range 128 to 159 remains as numeric entity instead of being converted to a character:

echo xml_entity_decode('€');
//Output € instead expected €

This depends on PHP version (at least for PHP >=5.6 the entity remains) and on the affected characters. The reason is that the characters 128 to 159 are not printable characters in UTF-8. This can happen if the data to be converted mix up windows-1252 content (where € is the € sign).