Fastest way to store easily editable config data in PHP?

Question

What is the fastest way to store config data in PHP so that it is easily changeable (via PHP)? First I thought about having config.php file, but I can\'t edit it on fly with

Answer 1

Serialize is a better option than JSON for storing PHP variables.

I like to use var_export for saving config file, and using include for loading config info. This makes it easy to save config data progmatically AND makes the data easy to read/write for a person as well:

config.php:

return array(
 'var1'=> 'value1',
 'var2'=> 'value2',
);

test.php:

$config = include 'config.php';
$config['var2']= 'value3';
file_put_contents('config.php', '

Updated config.php now contains the following:

return array(
 'var1'=> 'value1',
 'var2'=> 'value3',
);