PHP convert array to resource

Question

For visual representation, for simplicity and of course to feed my curiosity, I'm wondering how to convert a PHP array into a valid PHP resource.

See the below example: (example image created with dBug component available at http://dbug.ospinto.com/)

I've made 3 examples:

1. resource: this is the typical representation of a MySQL resource, visualized as a grid
2. object: a handmade create object from an array
3. array: a handmade multidimensional array

As you can see, the resource is a visual beauty, while the object and array are constructed by using multidimensional arrays, using poor numeric array indexes to bind them together :(

What I'm looking for, would probably be something like this:

$resource_var = (resource) $array_var;

Answer 1

What I'm looking for, would probably something like this:

$resource_var = (resource) $array(var)

You will never find that. A resource is an internal data-type in PHP. If (and only if) you write yourself a PHP extension and load it, you could do the following:

$resource = array_resource_create($array);

Your PHP extension then would create that resource (as the mysql extension for example creates its specific resource type) within that array_resource_create function. However, it would be useless, because there is no other function so far that could deal with that resource.

Answer 2

You can't create resource. but you can use native one.

Try with curl for example.

function makeResourceFromArray($array) {

    $resource = curl_init();

    curl_setopt($resource, CURLOPT_PRIVATE, serialize($array));

    return $resource;
}

function makeArrayFromResource($resource) {
    return unserialize(curl_getinfo($resource, CURLINFO_PRIVATE));
}

$resource = makeResourceFromArray(['name' => 'test']);

$array = makeArrayFromResource($resource);

Answer 3

The output you show there is nothing to do with it being a resource as such, but the pretty-print function you're using noticing that the variable you've given it points at a database result set, and fetching and displaying the results.

What PHP means by a resource is that the variable doesn't actually hold data within PHP, but is a pointer or reference usable by some lower-level module of code - in this case, a DB library which can use that reference to retrieve the results of the executed query.

If you just want the pretty-print to look similar for an array with a DB-resultset-like structure, then you should simply modify the pretty-print function to do so - you don't need to do anything to the array itself.