Introduction Zend_Serializer provides an adapter based interface to simply generate storable representation of PHP types by different facilities, and recover. Using Zend_Serializer dynamic interface To instantiate a serializer you should use the factory method with the name of the adapter: serialize($data); // now $serialized is a string $unserialized = $serializer->unserialize($serialized); // now $data == $unserialized } catch (Zend_Serializer_Exception $e) { echo $e; } ]]> The method serialize() generates a storable string. To regenerate this serialized data you can simply call the method unserialize(). Any time an error is encountered serializing or unserializing, Zend_Serializer will throw a Zend_Serializer_Exception. To configure a given serializer adapter, you can optionally add an array or an instance of Zend_Config to the factory() or to the serialize() and unserialize() methods: 'serialized by Zend_Serializer', )); try { $serialized = $serializer->serialize( $data, array('comment' => 'change comment') ); $unserialized = $serializer->unserialize( $serialized, array(/* options for unserialize */) ); } catch (Zend_Serializer_Exception $e) { echo $e; } ]]> Options passed to the factory() are valid for the instantiated object. You can change these options using the setOption(s) method. To change one or more options only for a single call, pass them as the second argument to either the serialize() or unserialize() method. Using the Zend_Serializer static interface You can register a specific serializer adapter as a default serialization adapter for use with Zend_Serializer. By default, the PhpSerialize adapter will be registered, but you can change this option using the setDefaultAdapter() static method.