serialize 2 dimensional array

[triplebit]

I have an array like as follows:

var a = [
[“val1”, “val2”, “val3”],
[“val4”, “val5”, “val6”,
[“val9”, “val8”, “val7″]
];
I want to serialize it so that I can set it as a value of a text box with id=input-id as follows:

<input id=”input-id” type=”text” name=”serialization_stack” value=””/>

serialized_a = serialize_array(a);

$(‘#input-id’).val(serialized_a);

Can someone help me to define the function serialize_array()?
Thx

[Shikkediel]

Something like this?

Link

[Alex Zaworski]

It’s possible I’m misunderstanding the question (based on Shikkediel’s repsonse) but can’t you just use JSON.stringify() here? MDN docs: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/JSON/stringify

[Shikkediel]

I’m not so sure either but it turns out to be quite an interesting question, going into the possibilities of JS methods. This one’s pretty neat too:

Demo

var result = a.map(function(it) {
  return it.join('&');
});

result = result.join('&');

So with the first step and .map a single new array is created while looping over each element (it), looking like this:

['val1&val2&val3','val3&val4&val5','val9&val8&val7']

Then that array is also turned into a string with join, using & as the separator character:

'val1&val2&val3&val4&val5&val6&val9&val8&val7'

[Shikkediel]

Or this way…

With forEach()

var result = '';

a.forEach(function(it) {
  result += it.join('&');
});

If I understood that to be intended with “serialization” correctly.

The JSON.stringify() approach was interesting as well but I stumbled upon the brackets, quotes and commas being quite circumventive to get removed from the string value.

codepen.io/anon/pen/ENgOOV

[Alex Zaworski]

You’d need some way to reconstruct the array without losing the dimensionality though— you can’t do that if you just concatenate everything.

[Shikkediel]

On the basis of the question I was assuming only serialisation of all the containing elements was needed. If it should be deserialised including inner structure again, JSON.stringify and JSON.parse would of course be more appropriate.

[triplebit]

Thx all
I tried JSON.stringify and it seems to be fine.
Regards

[Author]

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