Question

I’m working with an array of data that I’ve changed the names of some array keys, but I want the data to stay the same basically… Basically I want to be able to keep the data that’s in the array stored in the DB, but I want to update the array key names associated with it.

Previously the array would have looked like this: $var_opts['services'] = array('foo-1', 'foo-2', 'foo-3', 'foo-4');

Now the array keys are no longer prefixed with “foo”, but rather with “bar” instead. So how can I update the array variable to get rid of the “foos” and replace with “bars” instead?

Like so: $var_opts['services'] = array('bar-1', 'bar-2', 'bar-3', 'bar-4');

I’m already using if(isset($var_opts['services']['foo-1'])) { unset($var_opts['services']['foo-1']); } to get rid of the foos… I just need to figure out how to replace each foo with a bar.

I thought I would use str_replace on the whole array, but to my dismay it only works on strings (go figure, heh) and not arrays.

Answer 1

The idea:

1. Get a list of all your array keys
2. Modify each one of them as you choose
3. Replace the existing keys with the modified ones

The code:

$keys = array_keys($arr);
$values = array_values($arr);
$new_keys = str_replace('foo', 'bar', $keys);
$arr = array_combine($new_keys, $values);

What this actually does is create a new array which has the same values as your original array, but in which the keys have been changed.

Edit: updated as per Kamil’s comment below.