Removing the empty values from the array

Question

I have a array which i have extracted from html using DOM. Now as the below array shows there are many empty data which i dont want. So wenever i try to remove the empty values from the array its not removed.

Array ( [0] => [1] => Outpost Congratulations13 [2] => [3] => [4] => [5] => [6] =>
 [7] => Yard will reflect the type of work that they do and the strength and variety of their membership, from recent graduates to emerging and mid-career artists. 
[8] => [9] => [10] => [11] => Gallery  Closed Good Friday, open Bank Holiday Monday. Admission Free 
[12] => [13] => K  Yard, Castle Street 
[14] => [15] => Friday 1 Mar 3 [16] => [17] => [18] => [19] => www.somesite.co.uk 
[20] => [21] => [22] => [23] => Map [24] => [25] => Contact the Organiser Tell a Friend about this Event [26] => [27] => Plan Your Journey [28] => [29] => [30] => )

What all i have tried:-

array_filter : It did nt work.
Many functions to check whether the value is empty or not still did not work.
I tried to use strlen to find the length of empty strings , But it shows 22, 2 30 as the lenght.
I use str_replace to replace spaces with ntg still nt working and stlen is showing 22, 28,etc for empty values.
I have used trim bt no use...

Can anyone help me out as to why the strlen of a data is 22 or more. And how to remove these type of elements from array???

Could you post the array as PHP code so we can copy and paste, please? — Michael
– Michael, Commented Mar 12, 2013 at 13:17
are you sure they are empty? do a var_dump(); instead - If no callback is supplied, all entries of input equal to FALSE (see converting to boolean) will be removed. — Waygood
– Waygood, Commented Mar 12, 2013 at 13:17
An empty string with length of 22 is highly suspicious; could you echo bin2hex($arr[0])? — Ja͢ck
– Ja͢ck, Commented Mar 12, 2013 at 13:22

Waygood · Accepted Answer · 2013-03-12 13:24:05Z

3

since the data has empty strings (22 spaces etc) we need to trim them

$emptyRemoved = array_filter($myArray, 'trim');

answered Mar 12, 2013 at 13:24

Waygood

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11 Comments

Php Geek Over a year ago

Nope i tried it long back did nt work..........i already mentioned above, trim, str_replace....none worked

Ja͢ck Over a year ago

+1. Judging from the hex output, this is most likely the right answer :)

Michael Over a year ago

That'll remove string(1) "0" as well, though.

Waygood Over a year ago

Thats why I +1'd your answer

Ja͢ck Over a year ago

@PavanK You can apply bin2hex() on those strings as well to find out what characters are inside.

|

Michael · Accepted Answer · 2013-03-12 13:42:19Z

3

This should do what you need:

$array = array(
  'Hello',
  '',
  0,
  NULL,
  FALSE,
  '0',
  '    ',
);

$new_array = array_filter($array, function ($value)
{
    return strlen(trim($value));
}
);

This will give:

Array ( [0] => Hello [2] => 0 [5] => 0 )

The problem with using array_filter($array) or array_filter($array, 'trim') is that string/integer 0 will also be removed, which presumably isn't what you want?

Edit:

If you're using PHP < 5.3, use the following:

function trim_array ($value)
{
    return strlen(trim($value));
}

$new_array = array_filter($array, 'trim_array');

edited Mar 12, 2013 at 13:42

answered Mar 12, 2013 at 13:22

Michael

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6 Comments

Ja͢ck Over a year ago

+1. This is more explicit in which string property should be evaluated :)

Php Geek Over a year ago

@MichaelRushton how can we use function within the array_filter ?? I am getting syntax error

Michael Over a year ago

Sorry, had a partially removed print_r in there before. Fixed.

Php Geek Over a year ago

Its shoeing language feature nt compatible with php....can we use the function outside >?

Michael Over a year ago

What version of PHP do you have?

|

B3738 · Accepted Answer · 2013-03-12 13:25:19Z

function array_remove_empty($arr){
    $narr = array();
    while(list($key, $val) = each($arr)){
        if (is_array($val)){
            $val = array_remove_empty($val);
            // does the result array contain anything?
            if (count($val)!=0){
                // yes :)
                $narr[$key] = $val;
            }
        }
        else {
            if (trim($val) != ""){
                $narr[$key] = $val;
            }
        }
    }
    unset($arr);
    return $narr;
}

array_remove_empty(array(1,2,3, '', array(), 4)) => returns array(1,2,3,4)

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