title: htmlspecialchars is not working as I want! I want < to be gt, NOT &gt;
body: <p>This is my input:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This is the output I need:</p>
  
  <pre><code>gt
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But this is the output I GET from htmlspecialchars:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&amp;gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Basically, I want htmlspecialchars result, but really stripped down. I only want characters <code>a-z</code> and <code>0-9</code>.</p>
  
  <p>Can anyone help? </p>