The supported values of $format depend on the format handlers registered in the static
property Collection::$_formats. The Collection class comes with built-in support for
array conversion, but other formats may be registered.
Once the appropriate handlers are registered, a Collection instance can be
converted into any handler-supported format, i.e.:
$collection->to('json'); // returns a JSON string
$collection->to('xml'); // returns an XML string
_Please note that Lithium does not ship with a default XML handler, but one can be
configured easily._
public to ( string $format, array $options = [] ) : mixed | ||
$format | string | By default the only supported value is `'array'`. However, additional format handlers can be registered using the `formats()` method. |
$options | array | Options for converting this collection: - `'internal'` _boolean_: Indicates whether the current internal representation of the collection should be exported. Defaults to `false`, which uses the standard iterator interfaces. This is useful for exporting record sets, where records are lazy-loaded, and the collection must be iterated in order to fetch all objects. |
return | mixed | The object converted to the value specified in `$format`; usually an array or string. |