In PHP, how do you change the key of an array element?

Question

I have an associative array in the form key => value where key is a numerical value, however it is not a sequential numerical value. The key is actually an I

Answer 1

One which preservers ordering that's simple to understand:

function rename_array_key(array $array, $old_key, $new_key) {
  if (!array_key_exists($old_key, $array)) {
      return $array;
  }
  $new_array = [];
  foreach ($array as $key => $value) {
    $new_key = $old_key === $key
      ? $new_key
      : $key;
    $new_array[$new_key] = $value;
  }
  return $new_array;
}

Answer 2

I like KernelM's solution, but I needed something that would handle potential key conflicts (where a new key may match an existing key). Here is what I came up with:

function swapKeys( &$arr, $origKey, $newKey, &$pendingKeys ) {
    if( !isset( $arr[$newKey] ) ) {
        $arr[$newKey] = $arr[$origKey];
        unset( $arr[$origKey] );
        if( isset( $pendingKeys[$origKey] ) ) {
            // recursion to handle conflicting keys with conflicting keys
            swapKeys( $arr, $pendingKeys[$origKey], $origKey, $pendingKeys );
            unset( $pendingKeys[$origKey] );
        }
    } elseif( $newKey != $origKey ) {
        $pendingKeys[$newKey] = $origKey;
    }
}

You can then cycle through an array like this:

$myArray = array( '1970-01-01 00:00:01', '1970-01-01 00:01:00' );
$pendingKeys = array();
foreach( $myArray as $key => $myArrayValue ) {
    // NOTE: strtotime( '1970-01-01 00:00:01' ) = 1 (a conflicting key)
    $timestamp = strtotime( $myArrayValue );
    swapKeys( $myArray, $key, $timestamp, $pendingKeys );
}
// RESULT: $myArray == array( 1=>'1970-01-01 00:00:01', 60=>'1970-01-01 00:01:00' )

Answer 3

Here is a helper function to achieve that:

/**
 * Helper function to rename array keys.
 */
function _rename_arr_key($oldkey, $newkey, array &$arr) {
    if (array_key_exists($oldkey, $arr)) {
        $arr[$newkey] = $arr[$oldkey];
        unset($arr[$oldkey]);
        return TRUE;
    } else {
        return FALSE;
    }
}

pretty based on @KernelM answer.

Usage:

_rename_arr_key('oldkey', 'newkey', $my_array);

It will return true on successful rename, otherwise false.

Answer 4

if your array is built from a database query, you can change the key directly from the mysql statement:

instead of

"select ´id´ from ´tablename´..."

use something like:

"select ´id´ **as NEWNAME** from ´tablename´..."

Answer 5

The answer from KernelM is nice, but in order to avoid the issue raised by Greg in the comment (conflicting keys), using a new array would be safer

$newarr[$newkey] = $oldarr[$oldkey];
$oldarr=$newarr;
unset($newarr);