Create nested hashes from an array of elements for JSON encoding - php

Question

I have produced an array of fruits stored somewhere. Say it looks like this
$myFruits = array("apples"=>1, "oranges"=>3, "bananas"=>5);
This array is then passed into a function that will return json-encoded data for an API.
First, I wanted to be able to return a list of all the types of fruits I have
{"fruits":["apples", "oranges", "bananas"]}
I used this to accomplish it
echo json_encode(array("scripts" => array_keys($scripts)));
Now, I would like each type of fruit to be contained in its own hash, as such
{"fruits":
[
{name: "apples"
},
{name: "oranges"
},
{name: "bananas"
]
}
This way I can add additional fields to each fruit object without breaking existing code that may be using previous versions of this API (eg: if I decided to add the fruit counts in there as well).
Seeing how I can just create a new array and assign my list of fruits to a key called "fruits", I tried to do the same for each inner hash:
$myFruits = array("apples"=>1, "oranges"=>3, "bananas"=>5);
$data = array();
foreach ($myFruits as $key => $value) {
// initialize an associative array for each fruit
$val = array();
array_push($val, array("name" => $key));
// add it to the list of fruits
array_push($data, $val);
}
// assign list of fruits to "fruits" key
$outData = array("fruits" => $data);
echo json_encode($outData);
But I get this instead
{"fruits":[[{"name":"apples"}],[{"name":"oranges"}],[{"name":"bananas"}]]}
There are extra square braces around each fruit hash, which I assume is because I'm using an array to store each key-value pair.
How would I get my desired output?

Answer 1

You're close to knowing what you're doing wrong. You're creating an array, and then just using it to add one item (another array) to it.
// initialize an associative array for each fruit
$val = array(); // this guy here is unnecessary!!
array_push($val, array("name" => $key));
// add it to the list of fruits
array_push($data, $val);
Instead, just push each individual array onto $data directly like this:
array_push($data, array("name" => $key));
DEMO

Answer 2

You are creating an extra level in your array, simply push a new array onto $data in each iteration:
foreach ($myFruits as $key => $value) {
$data[]=array("name" => $key, "count" => $value);
}
*edited as per your comment