Dynamic Array Allocation

[Anon]

What I need to do is create an array of size 'x' on the fly.

When an object is instantiated, it's constructor takes in two parameters. The size of the array depends on those two parameters and I'm looking for a way to declare and create the array such that the rest of the methods in the class can access the array and, of course, the data in it.

I.e.:

class Test {

var $ar_gsize;

function Test($arg1, $arg2) {
//I don't think this works...
//I think it creates an array of size 1
//with the value of index 0 being
//$arg1 $arg2
$ar_gsize = Array($arg1 $arg2);
} // end Test()

}// end class

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks in advance.

Best regards,

Jeremy Reed
[e-mail]

[rdhatt]

I'm gonna guess you're coming from another language (VB?)...but in PHP there is no need to size an array = they are always dynamic. As exaplained in the PHP manual [1], PHP arrays are truely "maps" which just a collection of key-to-value pairs. This way, they function just a like a array, but also a list, stack, hashtable, etc.

In your code, your comments are exactly right. The array() does not allocate an array in the sense you seem to be thinking. All array() does is return a new array with the key-value pairs passed. The following code is equivlant:

$ar_gsize[0] = $arg1 * $arg2

So all you really need to hear is delcare a new var:

var $foo;

You then can start add values whenever you want:

$foo[1] = 324;
$foo['bar'] = "doh";

PHP is smart enough to realize to know it's an array, to grow the array size, and will add the key-value pairs. You can remove key-value pair with unset().

Let me know if this answers your question.

[1] http://www.php.net/manual/en/language.types.array.php