efficiency

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

Can this be written in the form of a nice small 'for/next' loop?:

$com1 = rawurldecode($temp1[1]);
$com2 = rawurldecode($temp2[1]);
$com3 = rawurldecode($temp3[1]);
$com4 = rawurldecode($temp4[1]);
$com5 = rawurldecode($temp5[1]);
$com6 = rawurldecode($temp6[1]);
$com7 = rawurldecode($temp7[1]);
$com8 = rawurldecode($temp8[1]);
$com9 = rawurldecode($temp9[1]);

-Paul Duquesnoy

[eoghain]

Yes.

for ($i = 1; $i <10; $i++)
{
   $comVar = "com" . $i;
   $tempVar = "temp" . $i;

   $$comVar = rawurldecode($$tempVar[1]);
}

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

Thanks for the help, I've learned some new syntax just from that reply, but when I substituted the code, it didn't work -- no errors reported, it just didn't work... ideas?

-Paul

[eoghain]

I don't know why it doesn't work, I didn't test it though.

I suggest you put in some debugging statements to make sure everything is looking like you expect it to.

for ($i = 1; $i <10; $i++) 
{ 
   print "i = $i<br>\n";
   $comVar = "com" . $i; 
   $tempVar = "temp" . $i; 
   print "comVar = $comVar  -  " . $$comVar . "<br>\n";
   print "tempVar = $tempVar  -  "  . $$tempVar[1] . "<br>\n";

   $$comVar = rawurldecode($$tempVar[1]); 

   print "decoded comVar = " . $$comVar . "<br>\n";
}

The variable variables that I'm using may not like the subscriping and you may have to store the value into a temporay variable before trying to urldecode it.

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

That resulted in this at the top of the page:

i = 1
comVar = com1 - %24264%2C000
tempVar = temp1 - 
decoded comVar = 
i = 2
comVar = com2 - %24488%2C000
tempVar = temp2 - 
decoded comVar = 
i = 3
comVar = com3 - %24546%2C000
tempVar = temp3 - 
decoded comVar = 
.
.
.

I applied the same technique to a different portion of code, and it worked:

$temp1 = split("=",$contentArray[0]);
$temp2 = split("=",$contentArray[1]);
...
$temp19 = split("=",$contentArray[18]);

became:

for ($i = 1; $i <19; $i++) 
{  

     $tempVar = "temp" . $i;
     $$tempVar = split("=",$contentArray[$i-1]); 
}

(notice that there's no '$$' array in the one that works -- could that be the error? Is it legal to write $$tempVar[1] -- maybe that needs to be formatted differently?)

Thanks for your speedy assistance, it's greatly appreciated! 🙂
-Paul

[eoghain]

Do you have variables named $temp1 - $temp9 that are arrays? The debug code doesn't show that $temp1 holds any value.

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

Yes, temp1 is an array

Here are some pertenant exerpts of the code to show the value of temp1[1]:

// line 95
$content = fread ($fd, filesize ($contentFile));
// line 102
$contentArray = split("\n",$content);
// lines 104-108
for ($i = 1; $i <19; $i++) 
{
$tempVar = "temp" . $i;
$$tempVar = split("=",$contentArray[$i-1]); 
}

In this case, temp1[1] should equal a value in $contentFile

(hope this makes sense)

-Paul

[eoghain]

Well you are wrong in your assumption. In your example $temp1 isn't going to be an array it's going to be just the value of what exists in $contentArray[x]. You are pulling the value out of any array and putting it into a variable, that doesn't make the variable an array. Given this knowlegde your code should look like this:

for ($i = 1; $i <10; $i++)  

{  

   print "i = $i<br>\n"; 
   $comVar = "com" . $i;  

   $tempVar = "temp" . $i;  

   print "comVar = $comVar  -  " . $$comVar . "<br>\n"; 
   print "tempVar = $tempVar  -  "  . $$tempVar . "<br>\n"; 

   $$comVar = rawurldecode($$tempVar);  

   print "decoded comVar = " . $$comVar . "<br>\n"; 
}

That should give you the results you are looking for, and the debugging code will confirm it.

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

The new code gave me this:

i = 1
comVar = com1 - 
tempVar = temp1 - Array

Warning: rawurldecode() expects parameter 1 
to be string, array given in /home/cidesign/public_html/
clients/siepmann/update.php on line 124
decoded comVar = 
i = 2
comVar = com2 - 
tempVar = temp2 - Array

Warning: rawurldecode() expects parameter 1 
to be string, array given in /home/cidesign/public_html/
clients/siepmann/update.php 
on line 124
decoded comVar = 

To bring this back a few steps, this worked:

$com1 = rawurldecode($temp1[1]);
$com2 = rawurldecode($temp2[1]);
$com3 = rawurldecode($temp3[1]);
$com4 = rawurldecode($temp4[1]);
$com5 = rawurldecode($temp5[1]);
$com6 = rawurldecode($temp6[1]);
$com7 = rawurldecode($temp7[1]);
$com8 = rawurldecode($temp8[1]);
$com9 = rawurldecode($temp9[1]);

So I don't think the use of an array, or non-array is the issue - otherwise this would have turned up with errors as well. (it's just so darn verbose, when com9 turns into com50, I'm going to have a LOT of code)

-Paul

[eoghain]

Ok, so I'm guessing that $contentArray is an array of arrays. Every element in the $contentArray array is itself an array. So it's looking like you can't access an array element using variable variables, that's not a problem we just have to pull that array into another variable that we will use:

for ($i = 1; $i <10; $i++)   

{   

   print "i = $i<br>\n";  

   $comVar = "com" . $i;   

   $tempVar = "temp" . $i;   

   $tempArray = $$tempVar;

   print "comVar = $comVar  -  " . $$comVar . "<br>\n";  

   print "tempVar = $tempVar  -  "  . $$tempVar . "<br>\n";  

   print "tempArray[1] = " . $tempArray[1]

   $$comVar = rawurldecode($tempArray[1]);   

   print "decoded comVar = " . $$comVar . "<br>\n";  

}

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

I think you're right about the array in the array

but I'm getting an error from this new code as well, this may be simple to edit (?)

Parse error: parse error, 
unexpected '$' in 
/home/cidesign/public_html/clients
/siepmann/update.php on line 127

Line 127 is:
$$comVar = rawurldecode($tempArray[1]);

-Paul

[eoghain]

Yeah it's simple if you look. I forgot a ; in the line above that is printing out the $tempArray[1] value.

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

Yeah!!! It works!

Thank you so much for your help 😃

-Paul

[eoghain]

Your welcome.

If you plan on doing more PHP coding I suggest that you read through these posts again and see the progression we went through to find and fix the problem. These are standard debugging techniques and if you work through them yourself you may solve many of your problems without having to wait for someone else to show you what is wrong. Plus you will learn more and quicker.

[Paul_Duquesnoy]

For sure - I learned a whole lot of cool techniques in our conversation - I should be able to tackle the rest on my own.

I had no clue how to attack this before - I looked EVERYWHERE for samples, and examples, tutorials... you name it (what a headache)

What you've given me should help me a ton 🙂

-Paul