[RESOLVED] Searching through multidimensional arrays

Swiftaxe

Hi,

I need advice about searching through multidimensional arrays.

My array contains product data for a webshop. This is the structure:

$array = array( $category => 
    array( $product =>
       $id,
       $title,
       $price,
       etc... ));

There is several categories and in each category many products with it's data. What is a good way to search such an array for a product with a certain ID? I need the keys for each dimension returned so I can extract data from that product.

Is there a way to do this without having nested foreach loops?
Tell me If I am not clear enough.

Any help is greatly appreciated!

/Swiftaxe

johanafm

What's the possible values for $product?
And is the code you posted what you really use? It will only be able to hold one product per category. Else you'd need

$array = array( $category =>
    array( $product => array( $id ...) ) );

Swiftaxe

johanafm;10929567 wrote:
What's the possible values for $product?
And is the code you posted what you really use? It will only be able to hold one product per category. Else you'd need
$array = array( $category =>
    array( $product => array( $id ...) ) );

Thanks for replying. No that is not the code I am using. I was just trying to explain the structure.

Maybe this will be a better explanation:

$array['category'][0]['productTitle']
[string] [number] [string]

First there is an associative array holding the categories "$array['category']". Next level is not an associative array holding the products "$array['category'][0]". Each product is an associative array holding the properties of the product.

Was that a better explanation? =)

What is a good way of searching a somewhat complex array like this?

johanafm

Easy enough to do on your own

$arr = array(/* your array structure here ofc */);
$searchId = 15;

for ($catInd = 0, $notFound = true; $notFound && $catInd < count($arr); ++$catInd) {
	for ($prodInd = 0; $notFound && $prodInd < count($arr[$catInd]; ++$prodInd)
		if ($arr[$catInd][$prodInd]['productId'] == $searchId) {
			$matchingCategory = $catInd;
			$matchInsideCategory = $prodInd;
			$notFound = false;
		}
}

You could easily use array_walk_recursive as well, but you'd need a global variable to hold the matching array element, so it doesn't feel like a nice solution. Besides, you can break out of recursion. Even if your match was in the first element, it'd run through the lot of them.

It's possible there is an existing solution among the one thousand and one array functions. If you want to check this for yourself, just search for array on php.net, find array functions and start going through them 🙂

Swiftaxe

Thanks for the advice. Yes, I was hoping php had a good array function dealing with this kind of array search. On the other hand someone on another forum replied that it would be faster to search through the database with sql queries. So I will go for that solution.

Thanks for taking your time. 🙂

/Swiftaxe