Can someone please tell me how to parse the value for wp_capabilities? I've looked all around and been unable to pull out any explanation of this line:
a:1:{s:13:"administrator";b:1;}
Can someone please tell me how to parse the value for wp_capabilities? I've looked all around and been unable to pull out any explanation of this line:
a:1:{s:13:"administrator";b:1;}
Check out the normal WP codex:
http://codex.wordpress.org/Roles_and_Capabilities
Thanks kingler, but I already read that (and several threads on the wpmu forum dealing with capabilities). None of them help me understand what that string translates into for the system.
I get how roles and capabilities work, but not how this string communicates that information inside Wordpress.
More than it being an expression that communicates various values to the database? :)
you're in there pretty deep; I'm wondering what you need it for.
oh, i missed your point here.
You can check an user's roles and capacities in the WordPress system by using the following function:
current_user_can('manage_options')
Note here 'manage_options' is just one of the capacities. You can also use 'edit_post', and others.
Also, the roles and capacities are checked by WP internally, when you use add_option_page() and add_submenu_page() functions to add a specific menu page in the backend. The capacity is specified as a parameter.
Hope it helps.
I think I'm looking more for an explanation of the full string in its various parts. As to why... sort of because I can understand everything else, but this string is thwarting me, so I'm beating my head against the wall. I probably didn't need to know that the s:13 in
s:13:"administrator";
just relates to the number of characters in the following word ("administrator"). You can see that if you look at other strings - they'll have something like s:5:"admin", or s:10:"subscriber".
I still don't know what a:1 refers to, or b:1, but I'm getting the feeling that there is no documentation on it (at all) because most people don't think it's important - just something in WP that we users don't need to concern ourselves with.
But that sort of thing isn't WP-specific. It's part of database theroy, SQL etc...
So it's not documented or mention because "most" users don't go digging in the db at that deep of a level.
Oh, you are just too curious about things I guess :)
Anyway, this is a PHP-thing to encode array into a text string. Check the detail of this function:
a:1 here means following is an array with 1 element.
What's the b stand for then? Gotta admit that I don't understand this either. Have to work this out with the multi sites as you have to copy it over when you add them in.
kingler: perfect. Thanks so much. This is exactly the explanation I was looking for.
andrea_r: not so much database theory here, as just php language specifics. Makes sense in the end.
drmike: (from the serialize php page), b = Boolean.
Boolean
b:value; (does not store "true" or "false", does store '1' or '0')
I think we'll notice that all "b:"'s are followed by 1 or 0.
OK, that makes sense. Thanks