PHP: cast to (array) and return-type: array is not the same?!

Question

Hi! I have following problem in PHP:

print_r says its the same, gettype says same type.. but the last output works not for both cases... although they should be the same!!

this looks very strange for me...

code and output:

$docdatau = get_object_vars(json_decode($docdata));
$docdatau2 = (array)json_decode($docdata);

echo "1\n";
echo gettype($docdatau);
echo "\n";
echo "--------------------------------------\n";
print_r($docdatau);
echo "--------------------------------------\n";

echo "2\n";
echo gettype($docdatau2);
echo "\n";
echo "--------------------------------------\n";
print_r($docdatau2);

echo "out1\n";
echo "--------------------------------------\n";
print_r($docdatau[0]);
echo "out2\n";
echo "--------------------------------------\n";
print_r($docdatau2[0]);

The output:

1
array
--------------------------------------
Array
(

    [0] => stdClass Object
        (
            [produkt] => Produkt 2
            [laufzeit] => 24
            [addtext] => sdsd
            [provision] => 39
        )

    [1] => stdClass Object
        (
            [produkt] => Produkt 1
            [laufzeit] => 
            [addtext] => 
            [provision] => 0
        )

)
--------------------------------------
2
array
--------------------------------------

Array
(

    [0] => stdClass Object
        (
            [produkt] => Produkt 2
            [laufzeit] => 24
            [addtext] => sdsd
            [provision] => 39
        )

    [1] => stdClass Object
        (
            [produkt] => Produkt 1
            [laufzeit] => 
            [addtext] => 
            [provision] => 0
        )

)
out1
--------------------------------------
stdClass Object
(
    [produkt] => Produkt 2
    [laufzeit] => 24
    [addtext] => sdsd
    [provision] => 39
)
out2
--------------------------------------
--------------------------------------

out1 and out2 should produce the same results but doesnt..

perhaps anybody has a hint for me.. thank you.

greetings andreas k.

Answer 1

There are several PHP bugs about it:

• http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=45346
• http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=51635
• http://bugs.php.net/bug.php?id=46758

The same things happens here:

$obj->{0} = "hello";
$arr = (array)$obj;
echo $arr[0];

It happens because the "0" is used as string array key, whereas $arr[0] searches for the integer array key. It is documented in the PHP documentation simply by stating: integer properties are unaccessible (link).