Variable within variable possible?

Question

I am trying to create a loop statement for some of my code and am wondering how I can put a variable within another variable.

For example:

<?php 
$j=1;
while ($j <= 9): {

$f$jfname = $_SESSION['F$jFirstName'];
$f$jmi = $_SESSION['F$jMI'];
$f$jlname = $_SESSION['F$jLastName'];
}
 $j++; endwhile; 
?>

Where the goal is to have the j variable increase during the loop and change the values as:

$f1fname $f2fname $f3fname

and so on.

Any ideas?

EDIT

Yes I am aware that my INITIAL form was flawed in the way I captured information (as individual variables as opposed to arrays) so any answer telling me that SESSION is an array and so on is irrelevant because I cannot call any variables implicitly from the SESSION variables I created (without a line by line reference) All variable stored in SESSION are completely unique and independent of each other.

Answer 1

what about arrays? more: arrays of objects?

Answer 2

i don't know why you need this, but i you thought about it and realy want to do that, you just have to write

$varname = "f".$j."fname"; 
$$varname = ...

instead of

$f$jfname = ...

Answer 3

Oh, wait, I think I get it now.

How about we just have an array to contain it? Variable variables are messy enough, don't you think?

<?php
$f = array();
for($j = 1; $j <= 9; $j++) {
  $f[$j] = array();
  $f[$j]['fname'] = $_SESSION['F' . $j. 'FirstName'];
  // etc.
}
?>

Answer 4

php wont parse variables inside single quotes ', use double quotes " and try this format...

${'f'.$j.'fname'} = $_SESSION["F$jFirstName"];

Answer 5

Didn't test the code myself but perhaps something like:

<?php 
$names = array();
for ($j=1; $j <= 9; $j++) {
   if (! isset($names[$j]))
     $names[$j] = array();
   $names[$j]['fname'] = $_SESSION["F{$j}FirstName"];
   $names[$j]['mi'] = $_SESSION["F{$j}MI"];
   $names[$j]['lname'] = $_SESSION["F{$j}LastName"];
}
?>

Then you have an array with arrays of the userinfo

Answer 6

To references a variable given its name, you can do it as follows:

• Directly:

  $result=$myVar;
  

• From String:

  $result="$myVar";
  

• From Variable:

  $a='myVar';
  $result=$$a;
  

---

And your code....

    // preferred way
    $results=array();
    for ($j=1; $j<=9; $j++) {
        $result=array();
        $result['jfname'] = $_SESSION['f'.$j.'FirstName'];
        $result['jmi'] = $_SESSION['f'.$j.'MI'];
        $result['lname'] = $_SESSION['f'.$j.'LastName'];
        $results[$j]=$result;
    }

---

By the way,

$_SESSION['f'.$j.'LastName'];

Is the same as

$_SESSION["f{$j}LastName"];