PHP - Renumbering Array Keys After Unsetting Value [duplicate]

Question

I use a PHP array to store data about all the people a user is following on a website. Here is an example of how I have it set up:

$data = array(
    ['user1'] => array(
        [0] => 'somedata',
        [1] => 'moredata',
        [2] => array(
            [0] => 'Jim',
            [1] => 'Bob',
            [2] => 'Nick',
            [3] => 'Susy',
        )
    ),
);

As you can see, it is $data[user][2] that lists all the friends. The array has this exact appearance with [0] and [1] for keys because that is how var_export() does it. Now my problem is this. When someone unfollows somebody, I use unset() to delete that friend from the array. So if I want to unfollow Bob in the example above, it would be left with Jim, Nick, and Susy.

The only issue now is that the array keys do not renumber properly when they rename. So once Bob is gone it goes from 0 to 2 rather than Nick taking on the array key of 1. Now I can think of ways to do this myself but I would highly prefer if there were some PHP function specifically for solving this issue, that is, renaming these array keys to the proper numerical order. I checked out the sort() function but that seems for alphabetizing array values not keys.

You're using var_export() and saving the array to disk or similar, rather than storing this in a database? — Michael Berkowski
– Michael Berkowski, Commented Dec 4, 2014 at 3:20

Mohsin Rafi · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-05 14:54:39Z

9

You can use array_values to re index the array numerically.

$newArray = array_values($array);

answered Dec 5, 2014 at 14:54

Mohsin Rafi

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Comments

ercmcd · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-05 14:22:59Z

1

If you just want to re-index the array at that level, you could simply use array_values();

For example, assuming you are removing the "bob" entry, just call array_values at the level directly above bob after removing it.

unset($data['user1'][2][1]);
$data['user1'][2] = array_values($data['user1'][2]);

answered Dec 5, 2014 at 14:22

ercmcd

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Comments

TecBrat · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-05 15:29:16Z

1

I'd use array_values like this:

$data['user1'][2]=array_values($data['user1'][2]);

Here's the full code:

$data = array(
    'user1' => array(
        'somedata',
        'moredata',
        array(
            'Jim',
            'Bob',
            'Nick',
            'Susy',
        )
    ),
);

unset($data['user1'][2][1]);
var_export ($data['user1'][2]);

echo "\n\n";
$data['user1'][2]=array_values($data['user1'][2]);

var_export($data['user1'][2]);

Result

array (
  0 => 'Jim',
  2 => 'Nick',
  3 => 'Susy',
)

array (
  0 => 'Jim',
  1 => 'Nick',
  2 => 'Susy',
)

See it in action here: Sandbox

edited Dec 5, 2014 at 15:29

answered Dec 5, 2014 at 14:25

TecBrat

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Comments

Juank · Accepted Answer · 2014-12-04 03:22:00Z

0

You could use array_splice

$removedElement = array_splice($data['user1'][2], $indexOfUserToRemove, 1);

This alters the original array reindexing it, but only if the keys of the array are numeric.

answered Dec 4, 2014 at 3:22

Juank

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1 Comment

Tai Kwangi Chicken Over a year ago

I'll look into this one also and see which one (this or the other post) works better. Thanks!

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