How to convert String Array to php Array? - php

Question

How to convert Sting Array to PHP Array?
"['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']"
to
$data=['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two'];
Please let me know if anyone knows of any solution
I want to take array input via textarea. And I want to convert that to a PHP array.
When I'm through textarea
['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']
This is happening after submitting the from
"['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']"
Now how do I convert from this to PHP Array?

Answer 1

Assuming you are not allowing multi dimensional arrays, this will work:
$stringArray = "['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']";
$array = array();
$trimmedStringArray = trim( $stringArray, '[]' );
$splitStringArray = explode( ',', $trimmedStringArray );
foreach( $splitStringArray as $nameValuePair ){
list( $key, $value ) = explode( '=>', $nameValuePair );
$array[$key] = $value;
}
Output:
Array
(
['a'] => 'value one'
['key2'] => 'value two'
)
You will probably want to do some error checking to make sure the input is in the correct format before you process the input.

Answer 2

Extremely unsafe version using eval():
<?php
$a = "['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']";
eval('$b = '.$a.';');
print('<pre>');
print_r($b);
Use only when you are sure, that other people can't use your textarea input!
Using replacements to convert this to json is a much better option for public forms. Additionally, if you use this at your work, you probably would get fired :)
With syntax error catch:
<?php
$a = "['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two'dsbfbtrg]";
try {
eval('$b = '.$a.';');
} catch (ParseError $e) {
print('Bad syntax');
die();
// or do something about the error
}
print('<pre>');
print_r($b);

Answer 3

Another option:
<?php
$string = "['a'=>'value one','key2'=>'value two']";
$find = ["'", "=>", "[", "]"];
$replace = ["\"", ":", "{", "}"];
$string = str_replace($find, $replace, $string);
$array = json_decode($string, true);
var_dump($array);
?>