Question

can anyone explain why I can’t see what’s inside the array? I think it supposed to be able to have multiple numbers (subscriptions) so maybe that’s why I’m having trouble? Here’s the code.

 $num = $_SESSION['subscription_ids'];
 if(is_array($num))
  {
print_r($num);
  }
    else
  {
echo "not an array";
   }

//Thanks DonnieM, yet It's spliting out "Array ( ) " no joke. 

What is going on?

Answer 1

Your confusion apparently arises from the output of 1 for is_array.
is_array returns a boolean value (true or false). When outputting boolean values as text, true is represented as 1 and false as nothing (an empty string).

Therefore 1 just means yes, this is an array. It does not tell you how many elements there are in the array.