help simplifying function that adds and increments "image[]" into a array

Question

I've been working a lot with forms lately and decided to make a php script to simplify some aspects that I see myself repeating, I won't post the full monstrosity that I have created, but instead I will ask you to help me simplify the following code if possible:

function add($name,$input,&$array)
{
 $p = explode('[',$name);
 if(isset($p[1]))
 {
  list($key) = explode(']',$p[1]);
  if(ctype_digit($key))
  {
    $array['forms'][$p[0]][$key] = $input;
  }else{
    $array['forms'][$p[0]][] = $input;
  } 
 }else{
    $array['forms'][$name] = $input;
 }
}


$array = array();
add('image[]','',$array);
add('image[8]','',$array);
add('image[1]','',$array);
add('image[]','',$array);

echo '<PLAINTEXT>';
print_r($array);

it makes $array into:

Array
(
    [forms] => Array
        (
            [image] => Array
                (
                    [0] => 
                    [8] => 
                    [1] => 
                    [9] => 
                )

        )

)

the problem here is that if you add a "image" as the $name, then it must be added to the array as if it was Posted, so it will be array(image=>data), if you enter image[], then it will be array(image=>array(0=>data)).

I find my code to be way too bulky, I found parse_str, which parses the "image[]", but it did not serve me as I need the names to be added separately...

Can this function be made more elegant?

clarification:

Is there a better way to add "name[]" into a array as if it was part of a list of names to be added to the array.

so I need a parse_str replacement that does not overwrite the $array. Example:

$array = array();
parse_str('image[]=test',$array);
parse_str('image[]=test1',$array);
parse_str('image[]=test2',$array);

but the result looks like:

Array
(
    [image] => Array
        (
            [0] => test2
        )

)

but needs to look like:

Array
(
    [image] => Array
        (
            [0] => test
            [1] => test1
            [2] => test2
        )

)

This would really simplify the above function!

Answer 1

Perhaps throwing in an array_merge_recursive can help you simplify your code a bit. Working from John's method signature it might look something like this :

function add($value, &$target) {
    $temp = array();
    parse_str($value, $temp);
    $target = array_merge_recursive($target, $temp);
}

$array = array();
add('image[]=test',$array);
add('image[text8]=test4',$array);
add('image[]=test2',$array);
add('video[test5]',$array);

Which (as expected, I believe) also yields

Array
(
    [image] => Array
        (
            [0] => test
            [text8] => test4
            [1] => test2
        )

    [video] => Array
        (
            [test5] => 
        )

)

Hopefully this helps :)

edit :

If you'd like to have exactly the same behavior (in a minimal amount of lines), you could always rebuild the query string, append your value and parse it again. The resulting code isn't optimal or pretty, but it does the job ;). Illustrated :

function add($value, &$target) {
    $query = urldecode(http_build_query($target, '', '&'));
    $query = "{$query}&{$value}";
    parse_str($query, $target);
}

$array = array();

add($array, 'image[]');
add($array, 'image[8]=test4');
add($array, 'image[1]=test2');
add($array, 'image[]');

print_r($array);

Would result in

Array
(
    [image] => Array
        (
            [0] => 
            [8] => test4
            [1] => test2
            [9] => 
        )

)