To abbreviate links into '...' if they outreach a certain amount of space; use the preg_replace function instead.
For instance you grabbed the headlines of a news site for use on your own page and the lines are to long:
asuming the raw material is stored in $unedited;
$edited = preg_replace("/(>)([[:print:]]{52,})(<)/e", "'\\1'.substr_replace('\\2 ', '...', '48').'\\3'", $unedited);
echo $edited;
This will shorten strings longer than 52 characters into 51 characters, with the last being three dots...