[RESOLVED] decoding "binary shemes" into something comprehensive

ungovernable

Ok here is my situation: I use vBulletin, and I am trying to code something that would get the Custom Fields for each members from the database and display them

here is how the custom fields works: There is a FIELD NAME and a FIELD NUMBER.

I have a field called "CAT" where the field number is "2"
I have another field with the name "DOG" with the number "3"

Normally i would expect to find in the database where the custom fields are stored either the fields (something like "CAT, DOG") or the numbers (something like "2, 3")

but it displays a weird combinaison of numbers, and i don't understand how i can sort it so display the selected field numbers with their respective names

for example:
I have a member who has selected the following field numbers: 3, 7, 14, 16, 17

the result displayed is 106564

I can already display the weird results numbers and i don't need a script to query the database to find it for each members, this since vBulletin already has a variable to do it. What i want to do is to decode this weird numbers (like 106564) and convert it to the actual field numbers (3, 7, 14, 16, 17 in the example), then sort it in an array or something to replace each numbers with a name (1=fish 2=cat 3=dog 4=horse, etc....)

here is some explications i found on google (by a vbulletin developper), so i post it if this can help any of you to understand my problem:

The options that are selected for multiple choice checkbox fields are recorded using a binary scheme. If the user has only one option selected then the number stored for the profile field will be an integer power of 2 (1,2,4,8,16). If the user has no options selected then the field will be blank (not 0, just blank). If the user has more than one option selected then the number stored will not be an integer power of 2.

Weedpacket

[man]decbin[/man] will convert an integer into its binary representation.

decbin(106564) = 11010000001000100.

Have a look at where the '1' bits are located. Hint: count them from right to left.

ungovernable

ok, i think i understand how it works....

But i'm a php newbie, and binary is something new to me.... So could i ask if anyone would be cool enough to hook me up with a small code that would replace the binary representation with a corresponding word for each numbers ? (a example with 1-2 numbers would just be perfect and i can do the rest myself 🙂)

thanks for your time!

NogDog

Assume $selected has the value from that field, and $nbr is the number of possible selections:

for($ix = 0; $ix < $nbr; $ix++)
{
   if(pow(2, $ix) & $selected)
   {
      echo "Option $ix was selected<br />\n";
   }
   else
   {
      echo "Option $ix was NOT selected<br />\n";
   }
}

This assumes they are using a zeroth based numbering of the selections (first selection is number 0, the second is number 1, etc.).

ungovernable

hmm i tryed this but it doesn't work unless i'm doing something wrong

i have 21 fields total so i tryed this:

$bin = $post[field7];
$selected = decbin($bin);
$nbr = 21;
for($ix = 0; $ix < $nbr; $ix++)
{
if(pow(2, $ix) & $selected)
{
echo "Option $ix was selected<br />\n";
}
else
{
echo "Option $ix was NOT selected<br />\n";
}
}

it displays "Option $ix was NOT selected" 21 times if the user has selected any of the fields, or the opposite if no fields at all are selected...

the numbering of the selections is similar as what you mentioned, except the first field is number 1 and not zero.... I tryed changing $ix = 0 to 1 in the code, but without better result..

NogDog

I don't think you need (or want) to do the decbin() thing: just use the integer value from the DB. You only need that if you actually want to manually look at each binary digit yourself, but the "&" operator should be doing that by itself already.

ungovernable

ohhh it was just that

working perfectly the way i want 🙂 thanks a lot for your time and for the help!