Turn one dimensional array with string path into multi dimensional json object

Question

I am trying to parse some data and just cant seem to figure it out myself.

I have tried using recursion and got the general idea but i cant seem to work out getting the array indexes to line up right. Here is what I have so far:

public function reverse() {

$reversedValues= array();
foreach ( $this->sorted as $key=>$value ) {

    array_push( $this->reversedPaths ,$key  );
    array_push( $reversedValues , $value ); 
    //print_r($this->reversed);
    echo "<br />";

}
$this->reversed = $this->stringToArray($this->reversedPaths[0] , $reversedValues);
var_dump($this->reversed);
return  json_encode($this->reversed , false);
}

private function stringToArray($path , $values , $count = 0) {

$separator = '/';

$pos = strpos($path, $separator);

if ($pos === false) {
    //check for numbers so we know to add those to an json object
    if (is_numeric($path)) {
        //add it to the parent array of values...
    } 

    $reversed = array(
        $path => $values[$count],
    );

    return $reversed;
}

$key = substr($path, 0, $pos);
$path = substr($path, $pos + 1);


$reversed[$key] = $this->stringToArray($path  ,  $values , $count);
$count++;
//read in next path string
if (array_key_exists( $count ,$this->reversedPaths)) {

     $currentpos = strpos($this->reversedPaths[$count],  $path.$separator);
     $currentPath = substr($this->reversedPaths[$count], $currentpos );
     $nextpos = strpos($currentPath,  $separator);
     if ($nextpos === false) {

     } else {
         $nextPath = substr($currentPath, $nextpos + 1);
         $nextKey = substr($nextPath, 0, $nextpos);
         echo $nextKey;
         echo $nextPath;
        // echo $nextKey;
        //if this key equals first value of next path dont return but process recurssion again on it

        if ($nextKey !== false  ) {

            $reversed[$key][$nextKey] = $this->stringToArray($nextPath  ,  $values , $count);
        }
    }
} else {

}

return $reversed;



}

I was trying to read in the next path data to check if it is within the same array index but i just couldn't get it working. I know i am over complicating it but it doesn't seem like there is any easy way to accomplish this...

Answer 1

I had a crack at this. Based on the details you provided, it looks like you are trying to create a tree, like a directory structure: each / delimited string in the key represents a 'depth'. The solution I found was to create a multidimensional array for each element, parsing the current key into levels and recursively merge/replace the result into a master 'tree' array. This is what I have:

// original JSON string

$json = '{
    "one/two": 3,
    "one/four/0": 5,
    "one/four/1": 6,
    "one/four/2": 7,
    "eight/nine/ten": 11
}';

// convert to a PHP multidimensional array

$array = json_decode($json, true);

// init an array to hold the final result

$tree = [];

// iterate over the array of values
// explode the key into an array 'path' tokens
// pop each off and build a multidimensional array
// finally 'merge' the result into the result array

foreach ($array as $path => $value) {
    $tokens = explode('/', $path);
    while (null !== ($key = array_pop($tokens))) {
        $current = [$key => $value];
        $value = $current;
    }
    $tree = array_replace_recursive($tree, $value);
}

// show the result!

print_r(json_encode($tree, JSON_PRETTY_PRINT));

Yields:

{
    'one': {
        'two': 3,
        'four': [5, 6, 7]
    },
    'eight': {
        'nine': {
            'ten':11
         }
    }
}

Hope this helps :)