Are there any best practices for maintaining references in multidimensional arrays when merging arrays in PHP?

When merging multidimensional arrays in PHP, it's important to be aware that by default, PHP will not maintain references when merging arrays. This means that if you have references to elements in the original arrays, they may be lost after the merge operation. To maintain references, you can use the array_merge_recursive() function, which recursively merges two or more arrays, preserving keys and values. This function will ensure that references in the original arrays are maintained in the merged array. 

$array1 = ['a' => ['b', 'c']];
$array2 = ['a' => ['d']];
$mergedArray = array_merge_recursive($array1, $array2);

print_r($mergedArray);

Keywords

references multidimensional arrays merging arrays PHP functions arrays

Related Questions