XML_Serializer & references

hi, i am trying to understand whether i am doing anything wrong or whether there is another approach to my problem. i have a complex data structure, which includes references. when i try to serialize that object, XML_Serializer chokes. i've seen this problem before with functions like var_dump(). it's funny to me that print_r() can handle it quite well. anyway, if anyone can comment on this situation, i would appreciate it. i would simply love to find a way to ignore or identify the references, so that they wouldn't choke. here's a sample: require_once 'XML/XML_Serializer/Serializer.php'; $main = array(); $main['test'] = 'green'; $main['blue'] =& $main; // An array of serializer options $serializer_options = array ( 'addDecl' => TRUE, 'encoding' => 'ISO-8859-1', 'indent' => ' ', 'indentAttributes' => '_auto', 'rootName' => 'SESSION', 'defaultTagName' => 'SESSION', 'typeHints' => TRUE ); // Instantiate the serializer with the options $Serializer = &new XML_Serializer($serializer_options); // Serialize the data structure $status = $Serializer->serialize($main); // Check whether serialization worked if (PEAR::isError($status)) { die($status->getMessage()); } // Display the XML document header('Content-type: text/xml'); echo $Serializer->getSerializedData(); ~/darcy w. christ 1000camels