unset( ) not working PHP

Question

I have tried many different ways but im not able to unset a variable from an array. I started with a string and exploded it to an array, now i want to remove Bill. Im i missing some thing? I have visited php.net and i, still stuck...

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<title></title>

</head>
<body>

<?php


$names = "Harry George Bill David Sam Jimmy";

$Allname = explode(" ",$names);

unset($Allname['Bill']);

sort($Allname);

$together = implode("," ,$Allname);

echo "$together";
?>
</body>
</html>

You've got an array of names as values, but you're trying to use the value as an `index`. It's looking for data at position `Bill`, which doesn't exist. — christopher, Oct 23 '13 at 08:58
`$key = array_search('Bill', $Allname); if ($key !== false) unset($Allname[$key]);` — Mark Baker, Oct 23 '13 at 09:00
*sidenote:* you can always use `print_r()` or `var_dump()` to debug. — Raptor, Oct 23 '13 at 09:00
Chek this answer by GarciaWebDev http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1883421/removing-array-item-by-value — Valery Statichny, Oct 23 '13 at 09:00

score 19 · Accepted Answer · edited May 23 '17 at 12:26

19

That is because ['Bill'] is the value of the array entry, not the index. What you want to do is

unset($Allname[2]); //Bill is #3 in the list and the array starts at 0.

or see this question for a more detailed and better answer :

PHP array delete by value (not key)

edited May 23 '17 at 12:26

Community

1
1

answered Oct 23 '13 at 08:59

Henk Jansen

1,142
8
27

Thank every it makes scenes now..... I was able to accomplice what what i needed with the foreach loop. Thanks for the link 1intello – Hugo Oct 23 '13 at 12:07

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 23 '13 at 08:59

1

Because unset expect a key and not a value.

Bill is your value.

unset($Allname[2])

after your explode the array looks like:

array (

0 => 'Harry',
1 => 'George',
2 => 'Bill',
...
)

answered Oct 23 '13 at 08:59

MAQU

562
2
12

If i dont know the position of bill i would use a foreach? – Hugo Oct 23 '13 at 09:17
1

there are several ways to do it. a foreach loop is possible but i would prefer `array_search()` to get the key of Bill. `$key = array_search('Bill', $Allname);` – MAQU Oct 23 '13 at 09:25

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 23 '13 at 09:04

unset($arr['key']) unsets the key. Your keys are 0, 1 etc, not "Bill".

If you want to remove the value "Bill", it's easiest to do this:

$names            = 'Harry George Bill David Sam Jimmy';
$namesArray       = explode(' ', $names);
$namesWithoutBill = array_diff($namesArray, array('Bill'));

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Oct 23 '13 at 09:09

1

You can unset by array key
unset($Allname[2]);

answered Oct 23 '13 at 09:09

Ranjitsinh

49
8

score 1 · Answer 5 · answered Oct 08 '17 at 20:42

Sometimes, it looks like an array but it can be a printed string of an array... - It happens to the best of us...

Or in any case check your array is really an array. I know it sounds silly but sometimes after many hours of screen time , mistakes are made.

<?php

$MyArray = array('0' => 'this','1' => 'is','2' => 'an array');
echo is_array($MyArray) ? 'It Is an Array' : 'not an Array';

?>

This will output: It Is an Array.

unset( ) not working PHP

5 Answers5