How to cast variable to array

Question

I have a variable $v that can be either single string or array of strings
and I have a code:

$a = array();
if (is_array($v)) {
    $a = $v;
} else {
    $         


        

Answer 1

Actually if you want to cast to an array and not have to worry about what you put into it, the answer is

$var = (is_object($var)) ? array($var) : (array) $var;

You can test this with the following code

function toArray($var) {
    return (is_object($var)) ? array($var) : (array) $var;
}

$object = new stdClass;
$resource = fopen('php://stdout', 'w');
$closure = function () {};

$tests = array(
    array(toArray(true),      array(true),      'boolean true'),
    array(toArray(false),     array(false),     'boolean false'),
    array(toArray(null),      array(),          'null'),
    array(toArray(1),         array(1),         'positive integer'),
    array(toArray(0),         array(0),         'zero integer'),
    array(toArray(-1),        array(-1),        'negative integer'),
    array(toArray(1.5),       array(1.5),       'positive float'),
    array(toArray(0.0),       array(0.0),       'zero float'),
    array(toArray(-1.5),      array(-1.5),      'negative float'),
    array(toArray(''),        array(''),        'empty string'),
    array(toArray('foo'),     array('foo'),     'string'),
    array(toArray(array()),   array(),          'array'),
    array(toArray($object),   array($object),   'object'),
    array(toArray($resource), array($resource), 'resource'),
    array(toArray($closure),  array($closure),  'closure'),
);

foreach ($tests as $test) {
    ob_start();
    var_dump($test[0]);
    $a = ob_get_clean();
    ob_start();
    var_dump($test[1]);
    $b = ob_get_clean();
    assert($a === $b, "{$test[2]} is not the same");
}