title: how to replace special characters with the ones they're based on in PHP?
body: <p>How do I replace:</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>"ã" with "a"</li>
  <li>"é" with "e"</li>
  </ul>
  
  <p>in PHP? Is this possible? I've read somewhere I could do some math with the ascii value of the base character and the ascii value of the accent, but I can't find any references now.</p>