How to pass a serialized array to Symfony2 Command

Question

I create a symfony2 command with one argument. This argument is the result of serialize($array) function.

But, inside the command I'm not able to unserialize() the received argument, i always got an error:

Notice: unserialize(): Error at offset 5 of 48 bytes in ...

This is a example of the array i want to send to the command:

$array = array('key1' => '$value1', 'key2' => '$value2')

When i serialize the array (serialize($array)) this is the result:

a:2:{s:4:"key1";s:7:"$value1";s:4:"key2";s:7:"$value2";} 

I was thinking: maybe the problem is due to double quotes in the string (remember, is to send to a command as parameter), then, i apply the addslashes function:

addslashes(serialize($array)) 

This is the result:

a:2:{s:4:\"key1\";s:7:\"$value1\";s:4:\"key2\";s:7:\"$value2\";}

but im still receiving the same error when i try to unserialize the string inside the command execute() function.

Any idea?

Answer 1

SOLVED!!! the problem is with the operative system command line and the double quotes. There is a way to serialize the array and avoid double quotes as parameter in the command: encoding base64.

The solution is to encode the serialized array:

$serialized = serialize(array('key1' => 'value1', 'key2' => 'value2'));
//$serialized => a:2:{s:4:"key1";s:6:"value1";s:4:"key2";s:6:"value2";}

$base64 = base64_encode($serialize);
//$base64 => YToyOntzOjQ6ImtleTEiO3M6NjoidmFsdWUxIjtzOjQ6ImtleTIiO3M6NjoidmFsdWUyIjt9 

As you can see there is no quotes in $base64(that's one of the goals of base64_encode() ) Then, you can easily decode the string with base64_decode

$serialized = base64_decode($base64);
//$serialized => a:2:{s:4:"key1";s:6:"value1";s:4:"key2";s:6:"value2";}

$array = unserialize($serialized);
//$array => array('key1' => 'value1', 'key2' => 'value2')

I hope this help somebody