I have a set of strings that are formatted like "A.B.C" and can have varying 'depths'. I.E. one might be just "A" or could be "A.B.C.D".
I want to be able to convert it into the keys for an associative array. So "A" would translate to
$var["A"] = $val;
And "A.B" would translate to
$var["A"]["B"] = $val;
Using a recursive function and passing by &reference
$str = "A.B.C" ;
$letters = explode(".", $str);
$result = array() ;
function goDeep(&$array, $letters, $level){
if ($level >= count($letters)){
$array = "Your value here" ;
return ;
}
$array[$letters[$level]] = array() ;
goDeep($array[$letters[$level]], $letters, ++$level);
}
goDeep($result, $letters, 0);
var_dump($result); //3 - level deep array is ready.
Solution can be eval().
<?php
$a = "A.B.C";
$temp = explode('.',$a);
$keys = "";
foreach ($temp as $value) {
$keys .= "['$value']";
}
$val = "XXX";
$var = array();
eval('$var'.$keys.' = $val;');
print_r($var);
?>
Result like :
Array ( [A] => Array ( [B] => Array ( [C] => XXX ) ) )
$var is an empty array. Indeces A, B will be undefined.
eval is evil? Especially if the string comes from user input!