How to convert a simple array to an associative array?

If anyone is still wondering how to do this, there is an easier solution for this by using the array_combine function.

$array = array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5);
$assoc = array_combine($array,$array);

array_flip() is exactly doing that:

array_flip() returns an array in flip order, i.e. keys from trans become values and values from trans become keys.

Note that the values of trans need to be valid keys, i.e. they need to be either integer or string. A warning will be emitted if a value has the wrong type, and the key/value pair in question will not be flipped.

If a value has several occurrences, the latest key will be used as its values, and all others will be lost.

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But apart from that, there is only one type of array in PHP. Even numerical ("simple", as you call it) arrays are associative.

Your code is the exact equivalent of:

$assoc = array_fill_keys(array(1, 2, 3, 4, 5), 1); // or
$assoc = array_fill_keys(range(1, 5), 1);

array_flip(), while it may work for your purpose, it's not the same.

PHP ref: array_fill_keys(), array_flip()