PHP Arrays

An array stores multiple values in one single variable:

< ?php
$cars = class="phpkeywordcolor" style="color:mediumblue">array(class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"Volvo", class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"BMW", 
class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"Toyota");
class="phpkeywordcolor" style="color:mediumblue">echo class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"I like " . $cars[class="phpnumbercolor" style="color:red">0] . 
class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">", " . $cars[class="phpnumbercolor" style="color:red">1] . class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">" and " . 
$cars[class="phpnumbercolor" style="color:red">2] . class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">".";
class="phptagcolor" style="color:red">?>

What is an Array?

An array is a special variable, which can hold more than one value at a time.
If you have a list of items (a list of car names, for example), storing the cars in single variables could look like this:

$cars1 = "Volvo";
$cars2 = "BMW";
$cars3 = "Toyota";

However, what if you want to loop through the cars and find a specific one? And what if you had not 3 cars, but 300?
The solution is to create an array!
An array can hold many values under a single name, and you can access the values by referring to an index number.

Create an Array in PHP

In PHP, the array() function is used to create an array:

array();

In PHP, there are three types of arrays:

• Indexed arrays - Arrays with a numeric index
• Associative arrays - Arrays with named keys
• Multidimensional arrays - - Arrays containing one or more arrays

Get The Length of an Array - The count() Function

The count() function is used to return the length (the number of elements) of an array:

< ?php
class="phpnumbercolor" style="color:red"> $cars = class="phpkeywordcolor" style="color:mediumblue">array(class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"Volvo", 
class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"BMW", class="phpstringcolor" style="color:brown">"Toyota");
class="phpkeywordcolor" style="color:mediumblue">echo count($cars);
class="phptagcolor" style="color:red">?>