Perl -> PHP question

Did a google and archive search but I couldn't find anything related... I am migrating a bunch of perl CGI apps to PHP. In one of the perl pages a cookie is set and the value of the cookie is a perl hash. I am trying to duplicate that cookie in PHP to make my life 100 times easier. In perl: use CGI::Cookie; $session{value1} = "something"; $session{value2} = "else"; CGI::Cookie(-name=>'session',-value=>%session); In another perl script: use CGI; $query = CGI->new(); %session = $query->cookie(-name=>'session'); print "value1: $session{value1}\n"; print "value2: $session{value2}\n"; Output: value1: something value2: else To try and duplicate this in PHP, I first examined the data in the cookie that was set by perl: value1&something&value2&else So when I set the cookie in php I did: setcookie('session','value1&something&value2&else'); Obviously this doesn't work... %session just results in a single value of "value1&something&value2&else" rather than a hash. I also tried using Associative Arrays as they are the closest to the Perl Hash that I could find. $session[value1] = "something"; $session[value2] = "else"; setcookie('session',$session); The cookie then has the value "Array" Any suggestions...ideally I don't want to have to change anything in the perl scripts, I just want to retire them as PHP replacements are completed. The page that sets the cookie is the first page (obviously) and so would take the pressure off getting the other pages done in PHP. -- Tom Woody Systems Administrator NationWide Flood Research, Inc. phone: 214-631-0400 x209 fax: 214-631-0800 Don't throw your computer out the window, throw the Windows out of your computer!