file reading

xwin

Quick question.

I have a member file - members.txt, which contains a member id, there username, and other stuff.
I have another file, which contains comments. When a comment is written, it posts the comment, and the members id#. I'm having trouble displaying all of the comments, because it only seems to read the last line of the file.

Like...

$replyfile = file ("data/forum{$f}/{$id}.txt"); // get forum information

foreach ($replyfile as $line)
{
	list($rid, $reply, $memidr) = explode("|", $line); 
{
	$memmatch = file ("data/members.txt"); // get member details
	foreach ($memmatch as $line)
		{
			list($mid, $name, $md5, $postcount) = explode("|", $line); // format member details
				if ($mid == $memidr)
				{
					echo "<table border='1' cellspacing='1' width='95%'>\n"; 
					echo "<tr><td width='20%' height='16' valign='top'><center><b>$name</b></center><br><br>Posts: {$postcount}</td><td width='80%' height='16'>$reply</td></tr>\n";
					echo "<br>"; 
				}
		}
	}
}

echo "<br>\n";
echo "</table>\n";
echo "</center>\n";

The

if ($mid == $memidr)

line messes things up. It will only look at the last reply in the file. If I take it out, it makes it so each member in the file 'says' the comment, because it doesn't match the ids. It doesn't seem to loop again and again, till the end of the file...

Thanks,
xwin

Weedpacket

The problem may be to do with the variables used in these two lines:

foreach ($replyfile as $line)
...
    foreach ($memmatch as $line)

I'm not sure if using the same variable to iterate over both arrays will cause problems with stepping through them or not.

xwin

Tried changing them all. No difference.

Weedpacket

Originally posted by xwin
Tried changing them all. No difference.

Well, how about this: since $memmatch is going to be the same file ('members.txt') every time, reading it for every line of data/forum{$f}/{$id}.txt is definitely the Wrong Thing to do, anyway.

$replyfile = file ("data/forum{$f}/{$id}.txt");
$memmatch = file('members.txt');

Might as well break them all out into parts we're wanting now:

foreach($replyfile as $key=>$line)
{  list($rid, $reply, $memidr) = explode('|', $line);
   //We're only interested in $memidr and $reply
   $replies['memidr'][]=$memidr;
   $replies['reply'][]=$reply;
}
foreach($memmatch as $key=>$line)
{  list($mid, $name, $md5, $postcount) = explode("|", $line);
   $members['mid'][]=$mid;
   $members['name'][]=$name;
   $members['postcount'][]=$postcount;
}

Then you can look through the $replies and $members arrays for the information, instead of repeatedly falling back on the file system.

I observe also that you're starting a <table> in your inner loop - who knows how many <tables> will get written - but only one </table> will get written, because that lies outside both loops.

...and consider using a database instead.

xwin

<?php
echo "<center>";
echo "<table border='1' cellspacing='1' width='95%'>\n"; 

$replyfile = file ("data/forum{$f}/{$id}.txt");
$memmatch = file('data/members.txt');

foreach($replyfile as $key=>$line)
{  list($rid, $reply, $memidr) = explode('|', $line);
   //We're only interested in $memidr and $reply
   $replies['memidr'][]=$memidr;
   $replies['reply'][]=$reply;
}
foreach($memmatch as $key=>$line)
{  list($mid, $name, $md5, $postcount) = explode("|", $line);
   $members['mid'][]=$mid;
   $members['name'][]=$name;
   $members['postcount'][]=$postcount;
}
if ($mid = $memidr)
		{
			echo "<tr><td width='20%' height='16' valign='top'><center><b>$name</b></center><br><br>Posts: {$postcount}</td><td width='80%' height='16'>$reply</td></tr>\n";
			echo "<br>"; 
		}
echo "<br>\n";
echo "</table>\n";
echo "</center>\n";


?>

No errors, but still not quite there. I tried following your advice. Maybe I'm not interpreting it correctly?

Weedpacket

No, not there, because after building the arrays you're not using them. But that's okay; I mixed things up with them a bit. Instead of
$replies['memidr'][]=$memidr;
$replies['reply'][]=$reply;
it should be
$replies[]=array('memidr'=>$memidr, 'reply'=>$reply);
and likewise for $members.

Then we can begin looping.

foreach($replies as $reply)
{ foreach($members as $member)
  { if($member['mid']==$reply['memidr'])
    { ...
    }
  }
}

And use $member['name'] etc. instead of $name.

More sophisticated data structures can be built that would allow much faster lookups (a multidimensional replies array indexed primarily by member id would provide immediate access to all replies by that member, for example); but that's really something that has to be sorted out before coding begins - it's a real pain to start rebuilding the foundations when you're already fitting the utility lines.

xwin

echo "<center>";
echo "<table border='1' cellspacing='1' width='95%'>\n"; 

$replyfile = file ("data/forum{$f}/{$id}.txt");
$memmatch = file('data/members.txt');

$replies[]=array('memidr'=>$memidr, 'reply'=>$reply);
$members[]=array('memid'=>$mid, 'name'=>$name, 'postcount'=>$postcount);

foreach($replies as $reply)
{ foreach($members as $member)
  { if($member['mid']==$reply['memidr'])
    {
	echo "<tr><td width='20%' height='16' valign='top'><center><b>$name</b></center><br><br>Posts: {$postcount}</td><td width='80%' height='16'>$reply</td></tr>\n";
	echo "<br>"; 
    }
  }
}
echo "<br>\n";
echo "</table>\n";
echo "</center>\n";

sigh I'm sorry, I just really don't get this. I have a question about the above code, how does it know how to break between the variables (e.g. $mid, $name...) with a | ?

This code outputs: Fatal error: [] operator not supported for strings in /home/virtual/site18/fst/var/www/html/forums/includes/act/readtopic.php on line 87

xwin

Removed the [], fixed memid to mid, still returns nothing.

Weedpacket

Why did you take out the explode() lines? I kind of thought that keeping those would be obvious; that they went without saying - so I didn't say them.