From the perspective of someone that's just trying to get stuff done: $packet = array('response' => array('status' => 1,'message' => ''),'data' => array('id' => 1, 'username' => 'john doe'));
$packet = ['response': ['status': 1, 'message': '', 'data': ['id': 1, 'username': 'john doe'] ] ]; The clarity improvement above is an exponential function that gets better and better the more deeply nested you are. I don't know anyone that needs the ability to support full JSON notation in PHP, but there are entirely too many deeply nested array() declarations with lots of tabs in our lives, especially when we start working with things like JSON and/or Mongo or xyz. That's all I wanted to say to this. Cheers, M. -- Marcel Esser Vice President of Engineering, CROSCON +1 (202) 470-6090 marcel.es...@croscon.com Before printing this e-mail, please consider the rainforest.