[OT] Rev cgi vs php - another (practical) question

[jbv]

Hi list,

I'm in the process of translating a few Rev cgi scripts into php.

In those Rev scripts, I'm using a very handy feature : some data
is structured as lines of items and store as such in mySQL cells
configured as "text" for further processing..
I was wondering how to implement something similar to lines &
items in php... Obviously I could parse the strings and build arrays
(using my own parser or the explode() function)...

But is there any better / simpler solution ?

thanks in advance,
JB