public function readArray($file = null)
    {
        // Preprocessing
        $file = $this->_preProcess($file);

        // exception for the case that the file to read does not exist
        if (!$this->_resource_exists($file)) {
            throw new Doozr_Exception(
                'Could not read file into array. The file: "'.$file.'" does not exist. '.
                'Current operation failed. Check permissions too.'
            );
        }

        // return content as array
        return $this->_file($file);
    }