title: String concatenation vs array implode in PHP
body: <p>Having used Java for a long time my standard method for creating long strings piece by piece was to add the elements to an array and then implode the array.</p>
  
  <pre><code>$out[] = 'a';
  $out[] = 'b';
  echo implode('', $out);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But then with a lot of data.</p>
  
  <p>The (standard PHP) alternative is to use string concatenation.</p>
  
  <pre><code>$out = 'a';
  $out .= 'b';
  echo $out;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>To my surprise there seems to be no speed difference between both methods. When there is significant time difference usually it is the concatenation that seems faster, but not all of the time.</p>
  
  <p>So my question is: are there - apart from style and code readability - any other reasons to choose one approach over the other?</p>