Why does SimpleXML change my array to the array's first element when I use it?

Question

Here is my code:

$string = << 

 
  hello
  there<         


        

Answer 1

What @Yottatron suggested is true, but not at all the cases as this example shows :

if your XML would be like this:

    
        Lol1
        Lol2
        NotLol1
        NotLol1
    

Simplexml's output would be:

SimpleXMLElement Object
(
[lol] => SimpleXMLElement Object
    (
        [lolelem] => Array
            (
                [0] => Lol1
                [1] => Lol2
            )

        [notlol] => Array
            (
                [0] => NotLol1
                [1] => NotLol1
            )

    )

)

and by writing

$xml->lol->lolelem

you'd expect your result to be

Array
(
     [0] => Lol1
     [1] => Lol2
)

but instead of it, you would get :

SimpleXMLElement Object 
(
    [0] => Lol1
)

and by

$xml->lol->children()

you would get:

SimpleXMLElement Object
(
[lolelem] => Array
    (
        [0] => Lol1
        [1] => Lol2
    )

[notlol] => Array
    (
        [0] => NotLol1
        [1] => NotLol1
    )

)

What you need to do if you want only the lolelem's:

$xml->xpath("//lol/lolelem")

That gives this result (not as expected shape but contains the right elements)

Array
(
    [0] => SimpleXMLElement Object
    (
        [0] => Lol1
    )

    [1] => SimpleXMLElement Object
    (
        [0] => Lol2
    )

)