Pass existing php array to jquery - php

Question

I have a PHP array I want to pass to my jquery (replace the test array with my php array).
Array
(
[12] => Some Text
[6] => Another text
[11] => one more text
)
Jquery:
$('#SearchUser').typeahead({
source: [
{ ID: 1, Name: 'Toronto' },
{ ID: 2, Name: 'Montreal' },
{ ID: 3, Name: 'New York' },
{ ID: 4, Name: 'Buffalo' },
{ ID: 5, Name: 'Boston' },
{ ID: 6, Name: 'Columbus' },
{ ID: 7, Name: 'Dallas' },
{ ID: 8, Name: 'Vancouver' },
{ ID: 9, Name: 'Seattle' },
{ ID: 10, Name: 'Los Angeles' }
],
display: 'Name',
val: 'ID',
itemSelected: updateID
});
So how can I set the var for "source" to my php array?
Suggestions?
As always,, you are awesome!
-Tom

Answer 1

How I'd done it in one of my projects was,
$.get("<?= $baseUrl ?>search/data", function (data) {
var dataObject = JSON.parse(data);
$('#q').typeahead({
'source': dataObject,
// 'items': 5
});
});
and my search controller's data method is:
echo (json_encode($arr)); // $arr is ["a","b","c"] etc. but you can have an associated array too.
Basically, the point of showing my code is to say use json

Answer 2

You can use json_encode function of php to conver a php array to json. Then you can use the json as javascript array.
http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.json-encode.php
I don't know how you get data from php code to javascript code, but if you print data as json, you can take it via an ajax call.

Answer 3

Use PHP's json_encode() function to create a string that is a valid JSON, and then read that with jQuery's $.getJSON().
Something like this:
get_array.php
$someArray = /* whatever */;
echo json_encode($someArray);
read_array.js
$.getJSON('get_array.php', function(data) {
// data now contains your array
});
Alternatively, you could do something like this:
<script type="text/javascript">
var someArray = <?php echo json_encode($someArray); ?>
</script>
If you don't want the separate files and don't mind using a global variable for it.

Answer 4

You can do the following:
<script type="text/javascript">
var jsArray = <?php echo json_encode($phpArray); ?>
</script>
but it is a bad practice to mix language X with language Y.
Well, take a look at my answer to this post in which you can do the following in a better way:
Is echoing Javascript code condtionally based on server-side logic considered harmful?
Hope this helps :-)