How to turn a string into an array

[luftikus143]

Hi,

I would like to turn a hidden field value which I receive from an HTML page into an array. It would just be that something like:

[PHP]$layer = "boundaries"[/PHP]

should become:

[PHP]$layer[0] = "boundaries"[/PHP]

But if I use this:

[PHP] if (!is_array($layer))
{
$layer[0] = $layer;
}[/PHP]

it seems that PHP doesn't consider that $layer has been turned in array. Using the (!is_array) verification just after this, shows that $layer is still not considered as array...

What can/should I do? Thanks for any hints!

[coolsti]

if (!is_array($layer))
{
    $tmp = $layer;
    $layer = array();
    $layer[0] = $tmp;
}
 

I would do it this way. I don't know what PHP would do if you tried to redeclare $layer as an array and at the same time initialize its first and only member to the value stored as $layer. So better to break it up and use a variable like $tmp to store the original $layer value.

[luftikus143]

if (!is_array($layer))
{
    $tmp = $layer;
    $layer = array();
    $layer[0] = $tmp;
}
 

Great. Thanks a lot!

[pbmods]

You can also do this:

$layer = array($layer);
 

Since $layer is a string, when you say $layer[0], you are referencing the first character of $layer rather than converting it to an array.

This will also work:

http://www.example.com/path/to/script.php?layer[]=boundaries