#li3 > Lithium Documentation > lithium/util/Collection::toArray()

Extends

Exports a `Collection` instance to an array. Used by `Collection::to()`.

Parameters

mixed $data Either a `Collection` instance, or an array representing a `Collection`'s internal state.
array $options Options used when converting `$data` to an array: - `'handlers'` _array_: An array where the keys are fully-namespaced class names, and the values are closures that take an instance of the class as a parameter, and return an array or scalar value that the instance represents.

Returns

array Returns the value of `$data` as a pure PHP array, recursively converting all sub-objects and other values to their closest array or scalar equivalents.

Source

						public static function toArray($data, array $options = array()) {
		$defaults = array('handlers' => array());
		$options += $defaults;
		$result = array();

		foreach ($data as $key => $item) {
			switch (true) {
				case is_array($item):
					$result[$key] = static::toArray($item, $options);
				break;
				case (!is_object($item)):
					$result[$key] = $item;
				break;
				case (isset($options['handlers'][$class = get_class($item)])):
					$result[$key] = $options['handlers'][$class]($item);
				break;
				case (method_exists($item, 'to')):
					$result[$key] = $item->to('array');
				break;
				case ($vars = get_object_vars($item)):
					$result[$key] = static::toArray($vars, $options);
				break;
				case (method_exists($item, '__toString')):
					$result[$key] = (string) $item;
				break;
				default:
					$result[$key] = $item;
				break;
			}
		}
		return $result;
	}