Question

The empty() function in php 5.3 does not work well for associative arrays. I have an associative array that could have some 30+ elements.

$arr = array(
             'one'=>kwara, 
             'two'=>osun,
             ...
             'thirty'=>lagos
            )

If the associative array is empty like so:

$arr = array(
             'one'=>'', 
             'two'=>'',
             ...
             'thirty'=>''
            )

and I need to check if the array is empty, the following will not work in php 5.3.

if(empty($arr))
{
  echo "array is empty<br />>";
}
else
{
  echo "array is NOT empty<br />";
}

and will return ‘array is NOT empty’. I am aware that the behaviour is different in php 5.4 but my current platform is php 5.3.

To overcome this problem, I have used the following:

if(strlen(implode('',array_values($arr))) > 0)       
{

 echo "array is NOT empty<br />>";
}
else
{
  echo "array is empty<br />";
}

The question is: is there a better of achieving this in php 5.3?

Answer 1

Short answer: No

Longer answer: The array you are looking at is not empty at all, it contains a bunch of keys with zero length strings. Your solution is probably one of the shortest possible and readable. You may want to wrap it in a function of your own though.