This is probably a strange feature request, but I think it should be given a lot of thought, if it has not done so already.

The request is this:

strings should be treated as arrays of characters (which they are) when given as the arguement for functions which work on arrays.

so for example:
function foo ($chr) {
  echo $chr . "<br />\n";
}
$string = "bar";
array_walk($string,foo); would give the result:
b
a
r

Also, to be able to do this with strings:

$string = "fo";
$string{} = "o";
so that
$string == "foo" == TRUE

Also, another thing that comes up often, is when trying to do this:

$string = "foo";
foreach ($string as $i) {
  echo $string ."<br />\n";
}

does not work, and you have to do:

$string = "foo";
for($i = 0;$i <= strlen($string);$i++) {
  echo $string{$i} ."<br />\n";
}

like I said, give this some thought, perhaps toss it around on php-dev etc..

- Davey