Disclaimer
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2006
The opinions expressed herein are my own personal opinions and do not represent anyone else's view in any way, including those of my employer.
© Copyright 2006
PHP5 Error message that is caused by attempting to assign a value to an array element of a variable that is declared as a string.
Example that generates error:
$foo=’bar’;
$foo[0]=’bar’;
Get error message Fatal error: Cannot use string offset as an array in …
Explanation
$foo was declared as a string in $foo=’bar’.
$foo[0] is trying to append an element onto a string variable.
Example that does not generate error:
$foo[0]=’bar’;
$foo=’bar’;
Does NOT generate error.
Explanation
$foo[0]=’bar’ instantiates variable $foo as array since it has not been instantiated. Then assigns ‘bar’ to element $foo[0].
$foo=’bar’ implicitly re-declares $foo as a string and assigns ‘bar’ to it.
Example that does not generate error:
$foo=’bar’;
$foo=array();
$foo[0]=’bar’;
Explanation
$foo=’bar’ implicitly declares $foo as a string variable then assigns ‘bar’ as the value.
$foo=array() explicitly re-declares $foo as an array.
$foo[0]=’bar’ can now be executed as $foo is declared as an array.
Let me know if this helped you or if I am not clear on anything. Thanks.
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3:54 pm - July 15th, 2007
great stuff, really helped me out when getting this error with my session – thanks!
2:12 am - September 10th, 2007
thanks, to help me solve this problem…
6:51 am - October 2nd, 2007
hi,
I got the same fatal error on this line;-
$eta_array = explode(”-”, $this->servicesTimeintransit[$type]["date"]);
Do you know what is wrong with this line?
i added $eta_array =array() before the line above still no difference
12:24 am - October 4th, 2007
Tough to diagnose with just that bit of info, but I wonder if your problem has to do with $this->servicesTimeintransit[$type][”date”]
Does that matrix actually exist?
5:32 am - October 4th, 2007
Hi frank,
Thanks. Actually its the error happens after PHP4 upgrade to PHP5. I think the matrix does exist as it work in PHP4 but not PHP5.
How do I email you more on the code snippets?
11:04 am - October 4th, 2007
You can send me a message through the site.
6:49 pm - October 4th, 2007
Hi Frank,
“Fatal error: Cannot use string offset as an array”
appears in the code. Happened on this line $eta_array = explode(”-”, $this->servicesTimeintransit[$type]["date"]);
More code snippets below:-
$methods = array();
for ($i=0; $i servicesTimeintransit[$type])) {
$eta_array = explode(”-”, $this->servicesTimeintransit[$type]["date"]);
$months = array (” “, “January”, “February”, “March”, “April”, “May”, “June”, “July”, “August”, “September”, “October”, “November”, “December”);
$eta_arrival_date = $months[(int)$eta_array[1]].” “.$eta_array[2].”, “.$eta_array[0];
$_type .= “, ETA: “.$eta_arrival_date;
}
// END of doing things differently:
$methods[] = array(’id’ => $type, ‘title’ => $_type, ‘cost’ => ($this->handling_fee + $cost));
}
}
10:27 pm - October 4th, 2007
CJJune
The first thing that I see a problem with is your for loop statement.
for ($i=0; $i servicesTimeintransit[$type])) {
It should be in the form of
for ($i=0; $i<$var; $i++) {
I think you are getting “Fatal error: Cannot use string offset as an array” because servicesTimeintransit[$type] is an array and not an int or string. I gathered that servicesTimeintransit[$type] is an array as you are calling servicesTimeintransit[$type]["date"] two lines down.
I hope that helps.
5:38 am - October 5th, 2007
Hi frank,
I am not too sure how to solve this as this code is not written by me. This code is from UPSXML.
So what should I replace the line of code with to eliminate error?
1:47 pm - October 5th, 2007
Hmmm, if you did not write the code and have not changed anything, then you need to contact the creator of upsxml as the code that you have pasted is certainly incorrect in terms of the For loop.
As for debugging the line $eta_array = explode(”-”, $this->servicesTimeintransit[$type][”date”]);
try just returning the value to see what you are actually exploding by using
echo($this->servicesTimeintransit[$type][”date”]);
1:54 pm - October 5th, 2007
I forgot to answer your question. I don’t know what you should replace the For loop declaration with as I don’t know the proper logic the author was intending. The current declaration posted
for ($i=0; $i servicesTimeintransit[$type])) {
does not give me any indication.
I think someone has made a change to your code and you should find a backup copy to compare what has been change. Then move forward in debugging any further errors.
I hope that helps.
6:47 am - October 7th, 2007
I have no idea how?
Could be Curl problem in PHP5 as it works in PHP4?
10:44 am - October 10th, 2007
You would have errors pointing to Curl if that was the issue.
7:49 pm - October 18th, 2007
Yeap….I guess its not CURL as the error is on the line of code pertaining to array. …:-(
7:37 am - April 9th, 2008
thank you for explanation
11:50 pm - June 13th, 2008
Hi frank
something weird happened on my website ( weird for me at least **blush****
my website has been online for a year now.
the, 2 days ago , for no reason, when someone makes a search on my website, it gives :
Fatal error: Cannot use string offset as an array in /home/ramzi76/public_html/smartway/lib/system.lib on line 192
first. why such errors are auto-generated? i mean no one touched the files or updated anything?
now when i go to the said line, it is :
return strtoupper($fMemb[ login ][ 0 ]).str_repeat(”0″, 6 – strlen($fMemb[ id ])).$fMemb[ id ];
} // sysGetProfileCode
where is the error?
thx
12:22 pm - June 16th, 2008
ramzi,
Something must have if it was working before and now you are getting an error. Changing from one version of php to another might have different results in how implicit declarations happen also. I am not sure how each version handles it as I have not done full research into that, but I’m sure you can Google it.
One thing you can do debug your problem is to make sure
$fMemb[ login ][ 0 ]
$fMemb[ id ]
are both set and are also strings. It is hard to tell from just looking at the code as we cannot see what those array elements hold at the time of the error. If you can post the echos of those array elements to show the strings values, then it would help in determining the problem of you situation.
7:50 am - July 17th, 2008
I have a variable $parts.
$parts is as follows:
Array
(
[0] => Array
(
[Part] => Array
(
[unit_price] => 9500.000000
[id] => 0500-0300
)
[QuoteLine] => Array
(
)
)
)
I get the error when I try to do this:
printf(’%01.2f’, $parts[0]['Part']['unit_price']);
Any pointers to solve this error are greatly appreciated.
Thanks
9:36 am - July 17th, 2008
sshah,
It looks like your array was not constructed properly. First, you need commas between array elements. Second, you need to use single quotes around the element index instead of brackets [ ].
Also, the single quotes you have in the format parameter of printf are not the conventional single quotes. I am not sure if that would cause a problem too. It is worth sticking with convention for simplification.
Below is the fixed code to form your array.
———————————-
$parts = Array
(
Array
(
‘Part’ => Array
(
‘unit_price’ => 9500.000000,
‘id’ => 0500-0300
),
‘QuoteLine’ => Array
(
)
)
);
printf(’%01.2f’, $parts[0]['Part']['unit_price']);
———————————-
Hope that helps.
9:39 am - July 17th, 2008
sshah,
About the single quote convention comment, I realized that wordpress could have changed them for styling when you entered your comment like it happened with my response. Never mind that statement then as you probably have it correct in your code.
2:53 am - August 30th, 2008
Thank you. This was a fast help for me.
10:33 am - September 8th, 2008
Thanks
6:58 am - November 4th, 2008
This helped at the time I needed. It has saved me precious hours. thank you very much
9:48 am - November 11th, 2008
work for me too.. a no-exist-array hapens …. PHP4 dont report that… thanks
3:07 am - January 28th, 2009
Thanks very much. Perfect answer
12:34 pm - February 4th, 2009
thanks!
11:07 pm - February 5th, 2009
Hi,
I am also getting the error as “Cannot use a string as an offset array”
I am using PHP 5.
$FQL = “SELECT name, pic, uid FROM user where uid in (select uid2 from friend where uid1 = $hostid)”;
$result_set = $facebook->api_client->fql_query($FQL);
for($i=0;$i<$count;$i++)
{
$frid[]=$result_set[$i]['uid'];
$frname[]=$result_set[$i]['name'];
$frimg[]=$result_set[$i]['pic'];
}
What’s wrong in this code?
11:37 pm - February 5th, 2009
What is the value of $count? I don’t see that being set in your code.
11:50 pm - February 5th, 2009
$count is my friends count. It’s declared in my code.
$count=sizeof($friends); // It’s coming as 9.
12:02 am - February 6th, 2009
Thanks Franks for your quick reply. My complete php code is:
api_client;
$friends = $api_client->friends_get();
$hostid=$api_client->users_getLoggedInUser();
$frname = array();
$frimg=array();
$frprofurl=array();
$frid=array();
$count=sizeof($friends);
echo $count;
$FQL = “SELECT name, pic, uid FROM user where uid in (select uid2 from friend where uid1 = $hostid)”;
$result_set = $facebook->api_client->fql_query($FQL);
foreach ($friends as $id)
{
$frprofurl[]=”http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=$id”;
}
for($i=0;$i
Where I am going wrong?
1:26 am - February 6th, 2009
Frank, need quick help on this.
9:52 am - February 6th, 2009
Which line of code are you getting the error and is it the “fatal error cannot use string …” error?
11:36 am - April 20th, 2009
hey frank!
i think i need your help, please
i’m getting that same error and have no idea what i did wrong… check it out:
foreach ($content[$main_section_id] as $feature_key => $feature_value) {
echo("\n");
//var_dump(is_int($feature_key));
if($main_section_id == 'wasn')
echo($feature_value);
elseif($main_section_id == 'gd') {
echo("\n");
echo("\n");
echo("
stepcarousel.setup({
galleryid: 'gallery$feature_key',
beltclass: 'belt',
panelclass: 'panel',
panelbehavior: {speed:500, wraparound:true, persist:false},
defaultbuttons: {enable: true, moveby: 1, leftnav: ['arrowl.gif', 0, 0], rightnav: ['arrowr.gif', 0, 0]},
statusvars: ['reportA', 'reportB', 'reportC'],
contenttype: ['inline'],
onpanelclick: function(target){
if (target.tagName=='IMG' && target.parentNode.tagName=='A'){
$.ajax({
url: '../js/gallery.php',
data: 'tab=ILLUSTRATIONS',
success: function(html){
$('.preview').html(html);
}
});
return false;
}
}
})
\n");
foreach ($content[$main_section_id][$feature_key] as $content) {
echo("$content\n");
}
echo("\n");
echo("\n");
echo("");
}
now, i’m getting the error at the second ‘foreach’ loop:
foreach ($content[$main_section_id][$feature_key] as $content)
i’m setting the arrays up in a separate file, which looks a bit like this:
$data['main_section_ids'] = array("wasn", "gd", "wd", "c");
$data['menu_items']['wasn'] = array('Welcome', 'About', 'Services', 'News');
$data['menu_items']['gd'] = array('Illustrations', 'Editing', 'Logos');
//$data['menu_items']['wd'] = null;
$data['content']['wasn'][] = 'WELCOME';
$data['content']['wasn'][] = 'ABOUT';
$data['content']['wasn'][] = 'SERVICE';
$data['content']['wasn'][] = 'NEWS';
$data['content']['gd'][] = array('"', 'THINGS', 'OTHER THINGS', 'MORE STUFF');
$data['content']['gd'][] = array('other things', 'more of the same');
$data['content']['gd'][] = array('"', 'THINGS', 'OTHER THINGS', 'MORE STUFF');
i’ve tried to explicitly enter integer keys myself but it doesn’t help… the weird thing is, that it loops through that second foreach (the one that give me the error) once but throws the error on the second try. it should loop thrice.
any ideas!?
thanks for your time!!!
12:05 pm - April 20th, 2009
Lenz,
The line
foreach ($content[$main_section_id][$feature_key] as $content)
You are setting the value of $content[$main_section_id][$feature_key], which I assume is some kind of string, to the variable, $content, which is your source array. Then on the next time around the loop, $content is a string value but you are referring to it as if it is an array.
Just change the above line of code to
foreach ($content[$main_section_id][$feature_key] as $foo)
12:15 pm - April 20th, 2009
oohhhh, noooo!
thanks, man!!!
something about trees and forests comes to mind
really appreciate it! thank you very much!
12:41 pm - April 20th, 2009
np. Glad I can help.