How to pass php array in input type hidden in html form

Question

I want to pass my php array in my form input type as hidden.i have tried many times but it is giving me an array (key=>value,key=>value) in my input form.

This is my php code have a array.

 $my_arr = array();
 $my_arr['key']="value"; 

This is my html code

 <form method="post" action="next.php">
 <input type="hidden" name="my_form_data" value="<?php print_r($my_arr) ?>">
 <button name="submit_btn">Submit</button>
</form>

Any one please help me to pass php array in my input hidden element and how to get it in next page.

Answer 1

If I'm understanding you correctly, you can try this:

<form method="post" action="next.php">
 <input type="hidden" name="my_form_data" value="<?php echo htmlspecialchars(serialize($my_arr)) ?>">
 <button name="submit_btn">Submit</button>
</form>

Then in next.php you unserialize to get the PHP data structure back:

<?php
$my_arr = unserialize($_POST["my_form_data"]);

Answer 2

The easiest way is to make json as string by json_encode and then decode at the time of retrieve by json_decode,

<form method="post" action="next.php">
<input type="hidden" name="my_form_data" value="<?php echo json_encode($my_arr); ?>">
<button name="submit_btn">Submit</button>
</form>