Filtering Eloquent collection data with $collection->filter()

Question

I'm trying to filter the following collection using the collection filter() method:

$collection = Word::all(); 

where the JSON output looks like this:

[ { "id": "1", "word": "dog", "phonetic": "dog", "mean": "pies", "assoc": "some example text", "author_id": "3", "user_id": "3" }, { "id": "2", "word": "sun", "phonetic": "sun", "mean": "słońce", "assoc": "lorem ipsun dolor sit amet", "author_id": "3", "user_id": "2" }, ... ] 

However, when filtering the collection:

$filtered_collection = $collection->filter(function($item)     {         if($item->isDog())         {             return $item;         }  }); 

The filtered collection JSON output will look like this:

 {"1":  {  "id": "1",  "word": "dog",  "phonetic": "dog",  "mean": "pies",  "assoc": "some example text",  "author_id": "3",  "user_id": "3"  },  "2":  {  "id": "2",  "word": "sun",  "phonetic": "sun",  "mean": "słońce",  "assoc": "lorem ipsun dolor sit amet",  "author_id": "3",  "user_id": "2"  }} 

How can I keep the original JSON output when filtering a collection? I'd like to have an array of my Eloquent model instances when filtering the original collection . Thanks in advance :)

Answer 1

The collection's filter method calls array_filter on the underlying array, which, according to the PHP docs, preserves the array keys. This then results in your array being converted to a JavaScript object instead of an array.

Call values() on your collection to reset the keys on the underlying array:

$filtered_collection = $collection->filter(function ($item) {     return $item->isDog(); })->values(); 

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Side note: in newer versions of Laravel, you can use a higher order message to shorten the above into this:

$filtered_collection = $collection->filter->isDog()->values();