Defining array index constants or using associatve arrays

[Christian Hackl]

I honestly wasn't able to find an answer for this design question using
Google and Google Groups, so I apologize if it is asked too frequently :)

Anyway: Let's say I have a multidimensiona l array of the following kind:

$people = array(); // maps age and e-mail address to names
$people["Paul"] = array(21, "paul@foo.bar") ;
$people["Linda"] = array(22, "linda@bar.foo" );
$people["Max"] = array(19, "max@foobar.foo bar");

That obviously isn't satisfying. I don't want to remember the order in
which the data is saved for each array item. That would be tedious and
error-prone, I believe:

echo $people["Max"][1]; // a magic number...

So I might want to use an associatve array for each one:

$people = array();
$people["Paul"] = array("age" => 21, "mail" => "paul@foo.bar") ;
$people["Linda"] = array("age" => 22, "mail" => "linda@bar.foo" );
$people["Max"] = array("age" => 19, "mail" => "max@foobar.foo bar");

echo $people["Max"]["mail"];

Much more legible. As someone with some C++ and C background, that still
doesn't strike me as perfect, though. What if there are hundreds of
people to save? Isn't it a big waste (plus a performance hit) to put all
those identical strings ("age" and "mail") into the array?

I may as well define constants for the array indices:

define("PEOPLE_ INDEX_AGE", 0);
define("PEOPLE_ INDEX_MAIL", 1);

$people = array(); // maps age and e-mail address to names
$people["Paul"] = array(21, "paul@foo.bar") ;
$people["Linda"] = array(22, "linda@bar.foo" );
$people["Max"] = array(19, "max@foobar.foo bar");

echo $people["Max"][PEOPLE_INDEX_MA IL];


Is there any reason not to use this solution? My C++ and C thinking
might affect my reasoning in a way that is not good for PHP programming.
Any help on this design issue would be most appreciated, as would be
links where I can learn more about such basic PHP design guidelines.


--
Christian Hackl

[Jean-Baptiste Nizet]

Re: Defining array index constants or using associatve arrays

I would combine your second and your third solutions:

$people["Paul"] = array(PEOPLE_IN DEX_AGE => 21, PEOPLE_INDEX_MA IL =>
"p...@foo.bar") ;
$people["Linda"] = array(PEOPLE_IN DEX_AGE => 22, PEOPLE_INDEX_MA IL =>
"l...@bar.foo") ;
$people["Max"] = array(PEOPLE_IN DEX_AGE => 19, PEOPLE_INDEX_MA IL =>
"m...@foobar.fo obar");

Or, even better IMHO, I would use classes:

class Person {
var $age;
var $address;

function Person($age, $address) {
$this->age = $age;
$this->address = $address;
}

function getAge() {
return $this->age
}

function getAddress() {
return $this->address;
}
}

$people["Paul"] = new Person(21, "p...@foo.bar") ;

[Chung Leong]

Re: Defining array index constants or using associatve arrays

"Christian Hackl" <hacki@sbox.tug raz.at> wrote in message
news:42136241$0 $22324$91cee783 @newsreader01.h ighway.telekom. at...[color=blue]
> So I might want to use an associatve array for each one:
>
> $people = array();
> $people["Paul"] = array("age" => 21, "mail" => "paul@foo.bar") ;
> $people["Linda"] = array("age" => 22, "mail" => "linda@bar.foo" );
> $people["Max"] = array("age" => 19, "mail" => "max@foobar.foo bar");
>
> echo $people["Max"]["mail"];
>
> Much more legible. As someone with some C++ and C background, that still
> doesn't strike me as perfect, though. What if there are hundreds of
> people to save? Isn't it a big waste (plus a performance hit) to put all
> those identical strings ("age" and "mail") into the array?
>
> I may as well define constants for the array indices:
>
> define("PEOPLE_ INDEX_AGE", 0);
> define("PEOPLE_ INDEX_MAIL", 1);
>
> $people = array(); // maps age and e-mail address to names
> $people["Paul"] = array(21, "paul@foo.bar") ;
> $people["Linda"] = array(22, "linda@bar.foo" );
> $people["Max"] = array(19, "max@foobar.foo bar");
>
> echo $people["Max"][PEOPLE_INDEX_MA IL];
>
>
> Is there any reason not to use this solution? My C++ and C thinking
> might affect my reasoning in a way that is not good for PHP programming.
> Any help on this design issue would be most appreciated, as would be
> links where I can learn more about such basic PHP design guidelines.[/color]

No reason not to. You just don't gain much by going this route. PHP arrays
are very different from C arrays. They are hash tables. Even when you access
an element by a numeric index, PHP would still perform a hash look up. The
only thing you save speedwise is in the generation of the hash key. And if
you use a constant, you cough the saving back up, since the value of PHP
constants are obtained from a hash table at runtime. You do save on memory
though, since the key isn't stored multiple times in the hash table.

Objects are also implement using hash tables. There isn't a great difference
between $person->age and $person['age']. I prefer using objects for storing
data, since it makes more sense conceptually. Object properties are also
easier to interpolate into strings ("$person->age years old" vs
"{$person['age']} years old").

[Christian Hackl]

Re: Defining array index constants or using associatve arrays

Chung Leong wrote:
[color=blue]
> No reason not to. You just don't gain much by going this route. PHP
> arrays are very different from C arrays. They are hash tables. Even
> when you access an element by a numeric index, PHP would still
> perform a hash look up. The only thing you save speedwise is in
> the generation of the hash key. And if you use a constant, you cough
> the saving back up, since the value of PHP constants are obtained
> from a hash table at runtime. You do save on memory though, since
> the key isn't stored multiple times in the hash table.[/color]

Thanks for yours and Jean-Baptiste's answers. That's most interesting.
I'll probably go the arr["Index"] route then, since I am not to keen on
mixing classes into my currently purely procedural PHP code.

P.S.: Sorry for posting through Google, but my news server ate this
whole thread for reasons unknown (hence the late reply) :(

--
Christian Hackl

[Matt Mitchell]

Re: Defining array index constants or using associatve arrays


"Christian Hackl" <hacki@sbox.tug raz.at> wrote in message
news:1108775153 .386468.299660@ g14g2000cwa.goo glegroups.com.. .[color=blue]
> Thanks for yours and Jean-Baptiste's answers. That's most interesting.
> I'll probably go the arr["Index"] route then, since I am not to keen on
> mixing classes into my currently purely procedural PHP code.[/color]

Better to go $array['index'] as single quotes prevent evaluating the string
first for interpolations like $array["index"] would.

Unless you want to do that of course!

Matt