Need some math help (aghhh!)

scavok

I'll try to explain this as best I can.

I'm making a page for a world war 2 game I play (wwiionline.com) that will organize missions for my squad. It was going pretty smoothly until now. I'm trying to fill in a command structure.

A rough guideline of a command structure is this:

...
Battalion - Made up of 4 companies
Company - Made up of 3 platoons
Platoon - Made up of 3 squads
Squad - Made up of 10 soldiers

I have it so the mission creator can choose how many squads there are. Therefore if he picks 9 squads the command structure should set up like this:

1 Battalion
    1 Company
        1 Platoon
            1 Squad
            2 Squad
            3 Squad
         2 Platoon
            1 Squad
            2 Squad
            3 Squad
         3 Platoon
            1 Squad
            2 Squad
            3 Squad

I also have it where the mission creator can choose how many people can be in each squad. So if he picks 7 it needs to come out like this:

1 Battalion
    1 Company
        1 Platoon
            1 Squad
                Soldier 1
                Soldier 2
                Soldier 3
                Soldier 4
                Soldier 5
                Soldier 6
                Soldier 7
            2 Squad
                Soldier 1
                Soldier 2
                Soldier 3
                Soldier 4
                Soldier 5
                Soldier 6
                Soldier 7
            3 Squad
                Soldier 1
                Soldier 2
                Soldier 3
                Soldier 4
                Soldier 5
                Soldier 6
                Soldier 7

If he picks 3 squads, with 7 people in each, but only 4 people have signed up, and for different squads; it should look like this:

1 Battalion
    1 Company
        1 Platoon
            1 Squad
                Soldier 1
                Soldier 2
            2 Squad
            3 Squad
                Soldier 1
                Soldier 2

I HAVE TO put it all in an array to be able to print it out on the page.

This is the code I currently have:

	$squadnames = array();
	$i=1;
	$query = "SELECT * FROM phpbb_operations_users WHERE operation_id = $op_id";
	$result = $db->sql_query($query) or die(print_r($db->sql_error(),true));
	while($row=mysql_fetch_array($result)){
	  for ($o=1; $o <= $squads; $o++)
		if ($row[5] == $o) 
		{
			$squadnames[$o][$i]=$row[2];  //puts value in here
		}
		$i++;
	}

//$row[5] is the squad that the user selected.  $i is the amount of people signed up.  $row[2] is the nickname of the user.  So the multidimension array is: $squadnames[squadselection][elementinsquad] = username.


for ($i=0; $i <= $numbers; $i++)
{
	for($o=1; $o <= $squads; $o++) {
		if ($squadnames[$o][$i] != NULL)
		{ 
			$template->assign_block_vars('opinfo', array(
				'OP_REGISTERED' => $squadnames[$o][$i])
			);
		}
	}
}
//This just sends the multidimension array of names to the page.  It does not have any sort of command structure.  Just a list of nicknames from users who have signed up.  $numbers is the amount of people signed up.  $squads is the number of squads the mission creator chose.

//All of this code works

I'm thinking the best way to do this is by creating the structure as I fill in the names. I just can't think of how to do it. If someone could get me started, I could probably figure the rest out.

	for ($i=0; $i <= $numbers; $i++)
	{
		for($o=1; $o <= $squads; $o++) {
				$structure[$o] = "Battalian $i."; //every 4 companies put this in the array
				$structure[$o] = "Company $i."; //every 3 platoons put this in the array
				$structure[$o] = "Platoon $i."; //every 3 squads put this in the array
				$structure[$o] = "Squad $i.";  //every squad put this in the array
				$structure[$o] = $squadnames[$o][$i] //print out the usernames of the people in the squad.  Probably using a for loop or something.

// The $o in $structure[$o] would of course have some sort of arithmetic.  They won't (can't) be all the same.  I just don't know what I need.
		}
	}

I think I'm going braindead. If you have any questions or need more data, please just ask.

AstroTeg

Have you thought about using classes for this? I have a feeling you'll not only want to track who is in what squad, but some attributes about each soldier (such as name, rank, etc).

My first thought would be to have a class represent each chain of command. So you'd have a class to describe a battalion, a class to describe a company, a class to desribe a platoon, a class to describe a squad, and a class to describe a soldier.

Each class could contain the details pertaining to that particular class. You can then have a class contain an array of other classes. For example, you have a class for soldier, your class for squad may contain an array of soldiers belonging to that squad. For each squad, you'd setup a new squad class.

I don't know if this makes any sense. This isn't the only solution to this problem. But I think just using classes (regardless of how you organize them), will really help you solve this problem in an easier and more organized manner then what just plain arrays will do for you.