With statement in php

Question

I am wondering if there is something similar to javascript or VB's with statement but in php

The way this works, for example in VB is shown below. The two code snippets do the same effect:

array[index].attr1 = val1;
array[index].attr2 = val2;
array[index].attr3 = val3;

is equal to :

With(array[index])
    .attr1 = val1
    .attr2 = val2
    .attr3 = val3
End With

Answer 1

Not exactly the with statement, but you can use references in your example:

$r = &$array[index];

$r->attr1 = val1;
$r->attr2 = val2;
$r->attr3 = val3;

Answer 2

If needed with arrays as in your example, you can mimic the with statement by using the array_merge function:

$array = array(
    'index' =>  array(
                    'attr1' => 'val1',
                    'attr2' => 'val2',
                    'attr3' => 'val3'
                )                
);

var_dump( $array );

$array['index'] =   array_merge(
                        $array['index'],
                        array(
                            'attr1' => 'newval1',
                            'attr4' => 'newval4'
                        )
                    );

var_dump( $array );

Output:

array
  'index' => 
    array
      'attr1' => string 'val1' (length=4)
      'attr2' => string 'val2' (length=4)
      'attr3' => string 'val3' (length=4)
array
  'index' => 
    array
      'attr1' => string 'newval1' (length=7)
      'attr2' => string 'val2' (length=4)
      'attr3' => string 'val3' (length=4)
      'attr4' => string 'newval4' (length=7)