Question

I have an array of arrays in PHP and I want to access the variable-name of each array (as a string) inside the container array.

Have:

$container = array($array1, $array2, $array2);

Need:

foreach ($container as $anArray) {
    {...some other code...}
    echo variable_name($anArray);  // output: array1 array2 array3
}

I’m trying to run a foreach loop to output the name of each array with functions like the following (suggested in the PHP manual):

function vname(&$var, $scope=false, $prefix='unique', $suffix='value') {
    if($scope) $vals = $scope;
    else      $vals = $GLOBALS;
    $old = $var;
    $var = $new = $prefix.rand().$suffix;
    $vname = FALSE;
    foreach($vals as $key => $val) {
        if($val === $new) $vname = $key;
    }
    $var = $old;
    return $vname;
}

But that function understandably only outputs: anArray (x3)

I need to output: array1 array2 array3

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

It is not possible to retrieve the “names” array1, array2, array3 from an array created with array($array1, $array2, $array3). Those variable names are gone.

You can make the array keys the names though:
array('array1' => $array1, 'array2' => $array2, 'array3' => $array3)
A shortcut for this is compact('array1', 'array2', 'array3').