I have an array that looks like this:
$fruit = array('apple','orange','grape');
How can I find the index of a specific item, in the above array? (For example, the value 'orange')
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3 Answers
Try the array_search function.
From the first example in the manual:
<?php $array = array(0 => 'blue', 1 => 'red', 2 => 'green', 3 => 'red'); $key = array_search('green', $array); // $key = 2; $key = array_search('red', $array); // $key = 1; ?>
A word of caution
When comparing the result, make sure to test explicitly for the value false using the === operator.
Because arrays in PHP are 0-based, if the element you're searching for is the first element in the array, a value of 0 will be returned.
While 0 is a valid result, it's also a falsy value, meaning the following will fail:
<?php
$array = array(0 => 'blue', 1 => 'red', 2 => 'green', 3 => 'red');
$key = array_search('blue',$array);
if($key == false) {
throw new Exception('Element not found');
}
?>
This is because the == operator checks for equality (by type-juggling), while the === operator checks for identity.
2 Comments
mcgrailm
I think doing the if(in_array(. bit should protect me from the problme you noted after "be careful"
Dmitry Gamolin
There's a small error in the code, the array is not specified. It should be
array_search('blue', $array).have in mind that, if you think that your search item can be found more than once, you should use array_keys() because it will return keys for all matching values, not only the first matching key as array_search().
Regards.
Comments
You have to use array_search.
Look here http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.array-search.php
answered May 18, 2011 at 15:06
Nicola Peluchetti
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1 Comment
mcgrailm
Return Values Returns TRUE if needle is found in the array, FALSE otherwise.