Hello stack overflow experts,
I am working on a project that involves manipulating serialized WordPress data in R. I am currently facing difficulties in unserializing the data, making edits, and serializing it back to the original format. I would greatly appreciate your guidance and expertise on this matter.
I have reviewed the documentation and searched for relevant resources, but I haven't found a comprehensive solution to my problem.
The furthest I got towards promising results, was using php through wsl through system() to execute commands, as described below.
I would greatly appreciate any insights, code examples, or suggestions you can provide to help me successfully unserialize, edit, and serialize WordPress data in R.
Thank you in advance for your time and assistance.
example of input
"a:59:{s:6:\"gender\";a:1:{i:0;s:3:\"Man\";}s:7:\"country\";s:9:\"Nederland\";s:8:\"um_state\";s:9:\"Groningen\";s:31:\"um_question_employee_or_student\";s:7:\"Ik werk\";s:31:\"um_question_employment_contract\";s:4:\"Vast\";s:16:\"um_question_loan\";s:0:\"\";s:28:\"um_question_student_employed\";s:0:\"\";s:29:\"um_question_parents_guarantee\";s:0:\"\";s:29:\"um_question_extra_information\";s:0:\"\";s:18:\"um_question_couple\";s:3:\"Nee\";s:14:\"couple_country\";s:9:\"Nederland\";s:15:\"um_couple_state\";s:0:\"\";s:38:\"um_question_couple_employee_or_student\";s:0:\"\";s:38:\"um_question_couple_employment_contract\";s:0:\"\";s:23:\"um_question_couple_loan\";s:0:\"\";s:35:\"um_question_couple_student_employed\";s:0:\"\";s:36:\"um_question_couple_parents_guarantee\";s:0:\"\";s:36:\"um_question_couple_extra_information\";s:0:\"\";s:12:\"um-mailchimp\";a:1:{i:73;a:2:{s:10:\"wp_list_id\";s:2:\"73\";s:7:\"enabled\";s:0:\"\";}}s:23:\"um_terms_and_conditions\";a:1:{i:0;s:64:\"Ik ga akkoord met de algemene voorwaarden en privacy verklaring.\";}s:7:\"form_id\";s:2:\"93\";s:10:\"um_request\";s:0:\"\";s:8:\"_wpnonce\";s:10:\"3c0f9f0307\";s:16:\"_wp_http_referer\";s:16:\"/en/registreren/\";s:17:\"trp-form-language\";s:2:\"en\";s:10:\"first_name\";s:1:\"j\";s:9:\"last_name\";s:1:\"j\";s:10:\"birth_date\";s:10:\"2023/04/10\";s:10:\"um_address\";s:1:\"j\";s:13:\"um_postalcode\";s:1:\"j\";s:7:\"um_city\";s:1:\"j\";s:12:\"phone_number\";s:10:\"1234567890\";s:13:\"mobile_number\";s:0:\"\";s:10:\"user_email\";s:22:\"luuk+21@8590dii40ns.de\";s:22:\"um_question_profession\";s:1:\"1\";s:20:\"um_question_employer\";s:1:\"1\";s:17:\"um_question_study\";s:0:\"\";s:23:\"um_question_loan_amount\";s:0:\"\";s:22:\"um_question_net_income\";s:1:\"1\";s:30:\"um_question_net_income_student\";s:0:\"\";s:28:\"um_question_other_net_income\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"couple_first_name\";s:0:\"\";s:16:\"couple_last_name\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"couple_birth_date\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"um_couple_address\";s:0:\"\";s:20:\"um_couple_postalcode\";s:0:\"\";s:14:\"um_couple_city\";s:0:\"\";s:19:\"couple_phone_number\";s:0:\"\";s:20:\"couple_mobile_number\";s:0:\"\";s:17:\"couple_user_email\";s:0:\"\";s:29:\"um_question_couple_profession\";s:0:\"\";s:27:\"um_question_couple_employer\";s:0:\"\";s:24:\"um_question_couple_study\";s:0:\"\";s:30:\"um_question_couple_loan_amount\";s:0:\"\";s:29:\"um_question_couple_net_income\";s:0:\"\";s:37:\"um_question_couple_net_income_student\";s:0:\"\";s:35:\"um_question_couple_other_net_income\";s:0:\"\";s:10:\"user_login\";s:2:\"jj\";s:9:\"timestamp\";i:1681903650;}"
I have tried various native R methods, unsuccessfully.
# install.packages("base64enc")
library(base64enc)
serialized_data <- 'a:2:{i:0;s:6:"option";i:1;s:15:"another_option";}'
encoded_data <- base64encode(charToRaw(serialized_data))
# Unserialize the data
unserialized_data <- unserialize(rawToChar(base64decode(encoded_data)))
# Output the unserialized data
print(unserialized_data)
Using system() and WSL, I have successfully (un)serialized a single variable by constructing a command and executing it within WSL. For example:
variable <- "België"
command <- paste("wsl php -r 'echo serialize(array(\"", variable, "\"));'", sep = "")
system(command)
However, when attempting to work with the full serialized WordPress data, I encountered errors such as:
PHP Parse error: syntax error, unexpected identifier "gender", expecting ")" in Command line code on line 1
[1] 255
I have reviewed the syntax of the serialized data, ensured the PHP environment is properly set up within WSL, and checked the integrity of the PHP code. Despite these efforts, the errors persist.
Using system2() made no difference.
