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phparraysperformancestrpos

in_array vs strpos for performance in php

I am logging in users via windows authentication and then storing that user's rights in a session variable. I use a delimited method of rights storage in a database i.e:

$rights //retrieved from database 
= 'read,edit,delete,admin'

so my question is should I;

//generate variable
$_SESSION['userrights'] = $rights ($rights is retrieved from database)

//use strpos to find if right is allowed
if (strpos($_SESSION['userrights'],"admin") !== false) { // do the function }

OR

//make array of rights
$_SESSION['userrights'] = explode(',',$rights)

//use in_array to find if right is allowed
if (in_array("admin",$_SESSION['userrights'])) { // do the function }

Bit of a OCD question as I presume the difference will be pretty much negligible for what I am doing but which would be the faster (use less resources) method?

Any answers appreciated except ones that insult my method of rights storage!

Solution

  • strpos is the fastest way to search a text needle, per the php.net documentation for strstr():

    If you only want to determine if a particular needle occurs within haystack, use the faster and less memory intensive function strpos() instead.1