read .txt file content into php multi dimensional array

Question

I have a .txt file with content like this

1. Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory has -- -- -- -- -- area Council
   A. 4
   B. 6
   C. 7
   D. 2
   ANSWER: B
   
   

2. The Federal Capital Territory is associated with-- -- -- -- -- -- -- vegetation belt
   A. Sahel savanna
   B. Rainforest
   C. Guinea savanna
   D. Sudan savanna
   ANSWER: C
   
   

3. The most significant factor responsible for the ever increasing population of FCT is
   A. High birth rate
   B. Immigration
   C. Death rate
   D. CENSUS
   ANSWER: B
   
   

i would love to read the file content into a multi dimensional array so i can get each questions, its answers and the correct answer for each of the questions.

i have tried this:-

$array=explode("\n", file_get_contents('file.txt')); 
print_r($array);

but it doesn't give me what i want..

Answer 1

Alives answer gives a result that you probably can work with, but I think associative array is probably the way to go.

I look at each line to see if it has a question number => add new item in array with question number and question text.

If first char is letter and second is a dot, it's an answer => add answer letter as key and text as value.

If it's none of above it's the answer text => add key with ANSWER and value as the correct answer.

I use explode to split the lines. The third argument tells how many parts to split the string in.
With "2" it splits at first space meaning I have the question# as item 1 and question text as item 2 in the array.

https://3v4l.org/ZqppN

// $str = file_get_contents("text.txt");
$str = "1. Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory has -- -- -- -- -- area Council
A. 4
B. 6
C. 7
D. 2
ANSWER: B

2. The Federal Capital Territory is associated with-- -- -- -- -- -- -- vegetation belt
A. Sahel savanna
B. Rainforest
C. Guinea savanna
D. Sudan savanna
ANSWER: C

3. The most significant factor responsible for the ever increasing population of FCT is
A. High birth rate
B. Immigration
C. Death rate
D. CENSUS
ANSWER: B";

$arr = explode("\n", $str);

$res=[];

Foreach($arr as $line){
    If($line != ""){
        If(is_numeric($line[0])){
            Preg_match("/^\d+/", $line, $num);
            $res[$num[0]] =["QUESTION" =>explode(" ", $line,2)[1]];
            $q = $num[0];
        }Else if(ctype_alpha($line[0]) && $line[1] == "."){
            $res[$q][$line[0]] = explode(" ", $line, 2)[1];
        }Else{
            $res[$q]["ANSWER"] = trim(explode(":", $line, 2)[1]);
        }
    }
}

Var_dump($res);