PHP treats all arrays as associative, so there aren't any built in functions. Can anyone recommend a fairly efficient way to check if an array "is a list" (contains only numeric keys starting from 0)?
Basically, I want to be able to differentiate between this:
$sequentialArray = [
'apple', 'orange', 'tomato', 'carrot'
];
and this:
$assocArray = [
'fruit1' => 'apple',
'fruit2' => 'orange',
'veg1' => 'tomato',
'veg2' => 'carrot'
];
You have asked two questions that are not quite equivalent:
Consider which of these behaviours you actually need. (It may be that either will do for your purposes.)
The first question (simply checking that all keys are numeric) is answered well by Captain kurO.
For the second question (checking whether the array is zero-indexed and sequential), you can use the following function:
function isAssoc(array $arr)
{
if (array() === $arr) return false;
return array_keys($arr) !== range(0, count($arr) - 1);
}
var_dump(isAssoc(['a', 'b', 'c'])); // false
var_dump(isAssoc(["0" => 'a', "1" => 'b', "2" => 'c'])); // false
var_dump(isAssoc(["1" => 'a', "0" => 'b', "2" => 'c'])); // true
var_dump(isAssoc(["a" => 'a', "b" => 'b', "c" => 'c'])); // true
Surely this is a better alternative.
<?php
$arr = array(1,2,3,4);
$isIndexed = array_values($arr) === $arr;
Actually the most efficient way is thus:
function is_assoc($array){
$keys = array_keys($array);
return $keys !== array_keys($keys);
}
This works because it compares the keys (which for a sequential array are always 0,1,2 etc) to the keys of the keys (which will always be 0,1,2 etc).
Laravel use this approach.
PHP 8.1 adds a built-in function to determine whether an array is a list with those semantics, or not. the function is array_is_list:
$list = ["a", "b", "c"];
array_is_list($list); // true
$notAList = [1 => "a", 2 => "b", 3 => "c"];
array_is_list($notAList); // false
$alsoNotAList = ["a" => "a", "b" => "b", "c" => "c"];
array_is_list($alsoNotAList); // false
/**
* Determines if an array is associative.
* @param array $array
* @return bool
*/
function isAssoc(array $array)
{
$keys = array_keys($array);
return array_keys($keys) !== $keys;
}
Most answers have sub-optimal time/space complexity or are changing semantics. So, here is another answer with the fastest and most functionally correct solution:
function is_sequential_array(Array &$a) {
$n = count($a);
for($i=0; $i<$n; $i++) {
if(!array_key_exists($i, $a)) {
return false;
}
}
return true;
}
This answer has following advantages over other answers:
O(1) (many answers here use O(n) space!)array_key_exists instead of isset (remember, isset additionally checks for 'is not null', thereby changing semantics)O(n) (many answers here have best-case time complexity of O(n))After some local benchmarking, debugging, compiler probing, profiling, and abusing 3v4l.org to benchmark across more versions (yes, I got a warning to stop) and comparing against every variation I could find...
I give you an organically derived best-average-worst-case scenario associative array test function that is at worst roughly as good as or better than all other average-case scenarios.
/**
* Tests if an array is an associative array.
*
* @param array $array An array to test.
* @return boolean True if the array is associative, otherwise false.
*/
function is_assoc(array &$arr) {
// don't try to check non-arrays or empty arrays
if (FALSE === is_array($arr) || 0 === ($l = count($arr))) {
return false;
}
// shortcut by guessing at the beginning
reset($arr);
if (key($arr) !== 0) {
return true;
}
// shortcut by guessing at the end
end($arr);
if (key($arr) !== $l-1) {
return true;
}
// rely on php to optimize test by reference or fast compare
return array_values($arr) !== $arr;
}
From https://3v4l.org/rkieX:
<?php
// array_values
function method_1(Array &$arr) {
return $arr === array_values($arr);
}
// method_2 was DQ; did not actually work
// array_keys
function method_3(Array &$arr) {
return array_keys($arr) === range(0, count($arr) - 1);
}
// foreach
function method_4(Array &$arr) {
$idx = 0;
foreach( $arr as $key => $val ){
if( $key !== $idx )
return FALSE;
++$idx;
}
return TRUE;
}
// guessing
function method_5(Array &$arr) {
global $METHOD_5_KEY;
$i = 0;
$l = count($arr)-1;
end($arr);
if ( key($arr) !== $l )
return FALSE;
reset($arr);
do {
if ( $i !== key($arr) )
return FALSE;
++$i;
next($arr);
} while ($i < $l);
return TRUE;
}
// naieve
function method_6(Array &$arr) {
$i = 0;
$l = count($arr);
do {
if ( NULL === @$arr[$i] )
return FALSE;
++$i;
} while ($i < $l);
return TRUE;
}
// deep reference reliance
function method_7(Array &$arr) {
return array_keys(array_values($arr)) === array_keys($arr);
}
// organic (guessing + array_values)
function method_8(Array &$arr) {
reset($arr);
if ( key($arr) !== 0 )
return FALSE;
end($arr);
if ( key($arr) !== count($arr)-1 )
return FALSE;
return array_values($arr) === $arr;
}
function benchmark(Array &$methods, Array &$target, $expected){
foreach($methods as $method){
$start = microtime(true);
for ($i = 0; $i < 2000; ++$i) {
//$dummy = call_user_func($method, $target);
if ( $method($target) !== $expected ) {
echo "Method $method is disqualified for returning an incorrect result.\n";
unset($methods[array_search($method,$methods,true)]);
$i = 0;
break;
}
}
if ( $i != 0 ) {
$end = microtime(true);
echo "Time taken with $method = ".round(($end-$start)*1000.0,3)."ms\n";
}
}
}
$true_targets = [
'Giant array' => range(0, 500),
'Tiny array' => range(0, 20),
];
$g = range(0,10);
unset($g[0]);
$false_targets = [
'Large array 1' => range(0, 100) + ['a'=>'a'] + range(101, 200),
'Large array 2' => ['a'=>'a'] + range(0, 200),
'Tiny array' => range(0, 10) + ['a'=>'a'] + range(11, 20),
'Gotcha array' => $g,
];
$methods = [
'method_1',
'method_3',
'method_4',
'method_5',
'method_6',
'method_7',
'method_8'
];
foreach($false_targets as $targetName => $target){
echo "==== Benchmark using $targetName expecing FALSE ====\n";
benchmark($methods, $target, false);
echo "\n";
}
foreach($true_targets as $targetName => $target){
echo "==== Benchmark using $targetName expecting TRUE ====\n";
benchmark($methods, $target, true);
echo "\n";
}
A lot of the solutions here are elegant and pretty, but don't scale well, and are memory intensive or CPU intensive. Most are creating 2 new data points in memory with this solution from both sides of the comparison. The larger the array the harder and longer the process and memory used, and you lose the benefit of short circuit evaluation. I Did some testing with a few different ideas. Trying to avoid array_key_exists as it is costly, and also avoiding creating new large datasets to compare. I feel this is a simple way to tell if an array is sequential.
public function is_sequential( $arr = [] ){
if( !is_array( $arr ) || empty( $arr ) ) return false;
$i = 0;
$total = count( $arr );
foreach( $arr as $key => $value ) if( $key !== $i++ ) return false;
return true;
}
You run a single count on the main array and store a single integer. You then loop through the array and check for an exact match while iterating the counter. You should have from 1 to count. If it fails it will short circuit out which gives you performance boost when it is false.
Originally I did this with a for loop and checking for isset( $arr[$i] ) but this will not detect null keys which requires array_key_exists, and as we know that is the worst function to use for speed.
Constantly updating variables via foreach to check along with the iterator never growing past it's integer size let's PHP use it's built in memory optimization, caching and garbage collection to keep you at very low resource usage.
Also, I will argue that using array_keys in a foreach is silly when you can simply run $key => $value and check the key. Why create the new data point? Once you abstract away the array keys you've consumed more memory immediately.
Could this be the solution?
public static function isArrayAssociative(array $array) {
reset($array);
return !is_int(key($array));
}
The caveat is obviously that the array cursor is reset but I'd say probably the function is used before the array is even traversed or used.
Or you can just use this:
Arr::isAssoc($array)
which will check if array contains any non-numeric key or:
Arr:isAssoc($array, true)
to check if array is strictly sequencial (contains auto generated int keys 0 to n-1)
using this library.
This question is actually useless when it comes to array of php because with the nature of php an array should not have to be fully associative or indexing, it can be combination of both, the way user have define and assigned the value an array can be a combination of both. see the example below
$y= array(5);
$y["0x"]="n";
$y["vbg"]="12132";
$y[1] = "k";
var_dump($y); //this will output 4 element array
echo "</br>" .$y["0x"]."</br>".$y[0];
for($x=0;$x<sizeof($y);$x++){ // this will output all index elements & gives error after that
echo "</br> index elements ".$y[$x];
}
so the correct question that has to ask is , is all the element in array are associative or index. if you really know that it will only be either associative or indexing not a combination of these two, you can just simply use this method to find wether it is an index or associative array.
function AssocTest(&$arr){
if(is_array($arr)){
reset($arr); // reset pointer to first element of array
if(gettype(key($arr)) == "string"){ //get the type(nature) of first element key
return true;
}else{
return false;
}
}else{
return false;
}
}
you can use it as normal function
echo(AssocTest($y)? "Associative array": "Not an Associative array/ Not an array at all");
and important thing to remember evan you have initialize an array as associative but the names that you have gave the associative array is just numbers it will treat as an index array when it being read by php if you have not explicitly gave the string names. take a look at the example below.
$y["0"]="n";
$y["1"]="12132";
$y["22"] = "k";
//both will get the same output
echo "<br/> s0 ".$y["22"];
echo "<br/> s0 ".$y[22];
for($x=0;$x<count($y);$x++){
echo "<br/> arr ".$y[$x]; // this will output up to 2nd element and give an error after
}
so if you need to be sure all the elements of the array to be exactly indexed or either associative , there is no other way but go true all the elements and check each and every element key by generated index array as post by many people here.
function fullAssocTest(&$arr)
{
if(is_array($arr)){
return (array_keys($arr) !== range(0, count($arr) - 1));
}
}
its less coding, but this thing is really process intensive and really un-necessary work.
Sometimes you can get away with only checking if the first array's Key is 0.
$isSequential = array_keys($arr)[0] === 0
, or, faster, but more verbose version:
reset($arr); $isSequential = key($arr) === 0
For those using Laravel:
Arr::isAssoc returns true if the given array is an associative array. An array is considered "associative" if it doesn't have sequential numerical keys beginning with zero:
use Illuminate\Support\Arr;
$isAssoc = Arr::isAssoc(['product' => ['name' => 'Desk', 'price' => 100]]);
// true
$isAssoc = Arr::isAssoc([1, 2, 3]);
// false
Unless PHP has a builtin for that, you won't be able to do it in less than O(n) - enumerating over all the keys and checking for integer type. In fact, you also want to make sure there are no holes, so your algorithm might look like:
for i in 0 to len(your_array):
if not defined(your-array[i]):
# this is not an array array, it's an associative array :)
But why bother? Just assume the array is of the type you expect. If it isn't, it will just blow up in your face - that's dynamic programming for you! Test your code and all will be well...
function is_associative($arr) {
return (array_merge($arr) !== $arr || count(array_filter($arr, 'is_string', ARRAY_FILTER_USE_KEY)) > 0);
}
Yet another way to do this.
function array_isassociative($array)
{
// Create new Array, Make it the same size as the input array
$compareArray = array_pad(array(), count($array), 0);
// Compare the two array_keys
return (count(array_diff_key($array, $compareArray))) ? true : false;
}
I compare the difference between the keys of the array and the keys of the result of array_values() of the array, which will always be an array with integer indices. If the keys are the same, it's not an associative array.
function isHash($array) {
if (!is_array($array)) return false;
$diff = array_diff_assoc($array, array_values($array));
return (empty($diff)) ? false : true;
}
I've come up with next method:
function isSequential(array $list): bool
{
$i = 0;
$count = count($list);
while (array_key_exists($i, $list)) {
$i += 1;
if ($i === $count) {
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
var_dump(isSequential(array())); // false
var_dump(isSequential(array('a', 'b', 'c'))); // true
var_dump(isSequential(array("0" => 'a', "1" => 'b', "2" => 'c'))); // true
var_dump(isSequential(array("1" => 'a', "0" => 'b', "2" => 'c'))); // true
var_dump(isSequential(array("1a" => 'a', "0b" => 'b', "2c" => 'c'))); // false
var_dump(isSequential(array("a" => 'a', "b" => 'b', "c" => 'c'))); // false
*Note empty array is not considered a sequential array, but I think it's fine since empty arrays is like 0 - doesn't matter it's plus or minus, it's empty.
Here are the advantages of this method compared to some listed above:
array_values does not involve copying - what!?? It certainly does - as will be seen below)I've used benchmark kindly provided by Artur Bodera, where I changed one of the arrays to 1M elements (array_fill(0, 1000000, uniqid()), // big numeric array).
Here are the results for 100 iterations:
PHP 7.1.16 (cli) (built: Mar 31 2018 02:59:59) ( NTS )
Initial memory: 32.42 MB
Testing my_method (isset check) - 100 iterations
Total time: 2.57942 s
Total memory: 32.48 MB
Testing method3 (array_filter of keys) - 100 iterations
Total time: 5.10964 s
Total memory: 64.42 MB
Testing method1 (array_values check) - 100 iterations
Total time: 3.07591 s
Total memory: 64.42 MB
Testing method2 (array_keys comparison) - 100 iterations
Total time: 5.62937 s
Total memory: 96.43 MB
*Methods are ordered based on their memory consumption
**I used echo " Total memory: " . number_format(memory_get_peak_usage()/1024/1024, 2) . " MB\n"; to display memory usage
Just adding my two cents, and I think it should be pretty efficient based on @nonsensei 's benchmarks as well as being clearly legible:
function is_associative(array $array): bool
{
foreach ($array as $key => $value)
{
if (!is_string($key)) return false;
}
return true;
}
One cheap and dirty way would be to check like this:
isset($myArray[count($myArray) - 1])
...you might get a false positive if your array is like this:
$myArray = array("1" => "apple", "b" => "banana");
A more thorough way might be to check the keys:
function arrayIsAssociative($myArray) {
foreach (array_keys($myArray) as $ind => $key) {
if (!is_numeric($key) || (isset($myArray[$ind + 1]) && $myArray[$ind + 1] != $key + 1)) {
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
// this will only return true if all the keys are numeric AND sequential, which
// is what you get when you define an array like this:
// array("a", "b", "c", "d", "e");
or
function arrayIsAssociative($myArray) {
$l = count($myArray);
for ($i = 0; $i < $l, ++$i) {
if (!isset($myArray[$i])) return true;
}
return false;
}
// this will return a false positive on an array like this:
$x = array(1 => "b", 0 => "a", 2 => "c", 4 => "e", 3 => "d");
This is my function -
public function is_assoc_array($array){
if(is_array($array) !== true){
return false;
}else{
$check = json_decode(json_encode($array));
if(is_object($check) === true){
return true;
}else{
return false;
}
}
}
Some examples
print_r((is_assoc_array(['one','two','three']))===true?'Yes':'No'); \\No
print_r(is_assoc_array(['one'=>'one','two'=>'two','three'=>'three'])?'Yes':'No'); \\Yes
print_r(is_assoc_array(['1'=>'one','2'=>'two','3'=>'three'])?'Yes':'No'); \\Yes
print_r(is_assoc_array(['0'=>'one','1'=>'two','2'=>'three'])?'Yes':'No'); \\No
There was a similar solution by @devios1 in one of the answers but this was just another way using the inbuilt json related functions of PHP. I haven't checked how this solution fairs in terms of performance compared to other solutions that have been posted here. But it certainly has helped me solve this problem. Hope this helps.
/*
iszba - Is Zero Based Array
Detects if an array is zero based or not.
PARAMS:
$chkvfnc
Callback in the loop allows to check the values of each element.
Signature:
bool function chkvfnc($v);
return:
true continue looping
false stop looping; iszba returns false too.
NOTES:
○ assert: $array is an array.
○ May be memory efficient;
it doesn't get extra arrays via array_keys() or ranges() into the function.
○ Is pretty fast without a callback.
○ With callback it's ~2.4 times slower.
*/
function iszba($array, $chkvfnc=null){
$ncb = !$chkvfnc;
$i = 0;
foreach($array as $k => $v){
if($k === $i++)
if($ncb || $chkvfnc($v))
continue;
return false;
}
return true;
}
• Without callback it is ~30% faster than current leading answer, and possibly more memory efficient.
• Just negate the answer to know if the array should be considered associative.
I'm surprised no one has mentioned array_key_first()
For your test cases:
$sequentialArray = array('apple', 'orange', 'tomato', 'carrot');
$isIndexedArray = is_int( array_key_first($sequentialArray) ); // true
whereas
$assocArray = array('fruit1' => 'apple',
'fruit2' => 'orange',
'veg1' => 'tomato',
'veg2' => 'carrot');
$isIndexedArray = is_int( array_key_first($assocArray) ); // false
Read more about this function here.
function isAssoc($arr)
{
$a = array_keys($arr);
for($i = 0, $t = count($a); $i < $t; $i++)
{
if($a[$i] != $i)
{
return false;
}
}
return true;
}
In simple way you can check is array is associative or not by below steps
array_keys()array_filter() and
is_numeric()Function for above step is as below.
function isAssociative(array $array)
{
return count(array_filter(array_keys($array), function($v){return is_numeric($v);})) !== count($array));
}
I just use the key() function. Observe:
<?php
var_dump(key(array('hello'=>'world', 'hello'=>'world'))); //string(5) "hello"
var_dump(key(array('world', 'world'))); //int(0)
var_dump(key(array("0" => 'a', "1" => 'b', "2" => 'c'))); //int(0) who makes string sequetial keys anyway????
?>
Thus, just by checking for false, you can determine whether an array is associative or not.
function is_assoc(array $array): bool
{
foreach ($array as $iValue) {
if (is_array($iValue)) {
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
$d= is_assoc(["id",2,3]);
var_dump($d);
If your looking for just non-numeric keys (no matter the order) then you may want to try
function IsAssociative($array)
{
return preg_match('/[a-z]/i', implode(array_keys($array)));
}