Indexing Nested JSON in PHP

Question

It feels like a question which has already been asked but I have not been able to find an answer to this.

Say I have a JSON file like this:

    {
        "material": {
            "name": "material",
            "nav": [
              {
                "text": "Backgrounds",
                "url": "backgrounds"
              },
              {
                "text": "Templates",
                "url": "templates"
              }
            ],
            "methods": [{
                "index":[{
                    "title": "Material",
                    "description": "Bla",
                    "keywords": [ "website material", "sozai", "素材" ]
                }],
                "backgrounds":[{
                    "title": "Backgrounds",
                    "description": "Bla.",
                    "keywords": [ "website backgrounds", "tiled backgrounds"]
                }]
            }]
        }
   }

And I json_decode it

$pages = json_decode($data);

To access, say, material > methods > index > title, I could do

$pages->material->methods[0]->index[0]->title

And that is fine (or is it?)

But this would not work with variables mixed in. Elsewhere I get the method name ($method, which will be "index") and put it in place of index.

$pages->material->methods[0]->$method[0]->title

This results in a "Undefined property: stdClass::$i"

I am aware that I can break this problem up into more lines storing the array in a new variable then indexing from there, but that is what I am trying to find the alternative to.

I would like to know if there is a more intuitive way to index this (without the [0]?) without going outside that one expression.

Pass true to the second parameter of json_decode() to force it to be an associative array. Then you can use your variable, eg $pages['material']['methods'][0][$method][0]['title'] — Phil
– Phil, Commented Mar 14, 2015 at 0:04
@Cyclone and Phil Thank you for your comments, those two ways would both work. I still felt like I was doing something wrong because of the [0]s - but it looks like I'm just thinking too much into it. — naturaljoin
– naturaljoin, Commented Mar 14, 2015 at 0:08

ceejayoz · Accepted Answer · 2015-03-14 00:05:38Z

2

If $method is index, $method[0] is the first character of the string, i.

A simple:

$pages->material->methods[0]->$method->title

or

$pages->material->methods[0]->{$method}->title

(slightly clearer to read, IMO) should suffice.

answered Mar 14, 2015 at 0:05

ceejayoz

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2 Comments

naturaljoin Over a year ago

The proposed code does not work since index (or $method) is an array and not an object - but I will use the { } way to separate the variable from the expression.

ceejayoz Over a year ago

@tonytony I was going off the statement $method, which will be "index". Adjust as necessary if it's an array.

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