是否有可能将变量计算为多维PHP数组索引

Question

Given a multidimensional array or dictionary $array.

And assuming that $array['foo']['bar']['baz'] = 'something';

Is there a way other than via an eval statement for me use the multi-dimentional index foo/bar/baz? (The use case is in creating the index dynamically i.e. The function does not know what /foo/bar/baz/ is).

The only way I could figure to do this was:

$item = testGetIndex($array, "'foo']['bar']['baz'");

function testGetIndex($array, $index) {
  eval('$item = $array[' . $index . '];');
  return $item;
}

---

Note: I should mention that I do not want to search this array. This is a weird use case. I am being passed a very large multi dimensional array and it's ugly to have to use constructs like..

$array[foo][bar]..[baz] to make modifications to the array.

Answer 1

To modify an array using a path:

function setPath(&$root, $path, $value)
{
        $paths = explode('/', $path);
        $current = &$root;

        foreach ($paths as $path) {
                if (isset($current[$path])) {
                        $current = &$current[$path];
                } else {
                        return null;
                }
        }

        return $current = $value;
}
$path = 'foo/bar/baz';
$root = array('foo' => array('bar' => array('baz' => 'something')));

setPath($root, $path, '123');

You can tweak the function to just return a reference to the element you wish to change:

function &getPath(&$root, $path)
{
        $paths = explode('/', $path);
        $current = &$root;

        foreach ($paths as $path) {
                if (isset($current[$path])) {
                        $current = &$current[$path];
                } else {
                        return null;
                }
        }

        return $current;
}

$x = &getPath($root, $path);

$x = 456; // $root['foo']['bar']['baz'] == 456