I am unsure what kind of loop to use in php - php

Question

I am newer to PHP and I am able to get the desired output but I am doing it one index position at a time. I am returning data from a .txt file and I need to insert this data into an HTML table I am creating using PHP. BUT FIRST I need to be able to get the same output without typing out every index position. I tried to use a forloop but it kept outputting only one line.
I manually outputted the lines from the file and it works. What loop in PHP would be best to achieve the same results and output these elements? IMPORTANT, as is I am able to sort and rsort (I want to be able to do this so if it can be implemented in the loop that would be awesome) any help is more than I have right now.
PHP
$books = array();
if ($fp)
{
while(true)
{
$lines_in_file = count(file($filename));
$line = fgets($fp);
if (feof($fp))
{
break;
}
$line_ctr++;
list($title, $author, $pubdate, $isbn) = explode('*', $line);
$new_line = explode('*', $line);
for($ii= 1; $ii <= $lines_in_file; $ii++){
$lines = fgets($fp); //Read each line
$member = trim($lines);
array_push($books, $member);
}
//This foreach only brings back the first like in the txt file, why?
$cntr = 0;
foreach($books as $element){
$cntr++;
$table .= "<tr>";
$table .= "<td>".$title."</td>";
$table .= "<td>".$author."</td>";
$table .= "<td>".$pubdate."</td>";
$table .= "<td>".$pubdate."</td>";
$table .= "<td>".$isbn."</td>";
$table .= "</tr>\n"; //added newline
echo $element;
}
//sort($books);
// rsort($books);
echo $books[0];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[1];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[2];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[3];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[4];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[5];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[6];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[7];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[8];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[9];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[10];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[11];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[12];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[13];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[14];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[15];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[16];
echo "<br>";
echo $books[17];
}//END WHILE LOOP
fclose($fp ); //Close file
}

Answer 1

Having to make a few guesses here but i believe the file is going to look like:
title*author*pubdate*isbn
title*author*pubdate*isbn
title*author*pubdate*isb
if this is wrong, let me know
as long as the fie is not to large read it in to an array:
$book_array=file('book_file.txt');
//print_r($book_array); //is it an array of the books, one book per array key
now to separate each line:
foreach($book_array as $line){
$line_sep=explode('*',$line);
// with no sorting option you could just echo inside the loop
//if you want to keep sorting options we have to keep the separated lines
$new_book_array[]=$line_sep;
}
unset($book_array);//free up memory if needed
//print_r($new_book_array);//is it a multi-d array, book then the 4 elements
to sort our new multidimensoanl array:
usort($new_book_array, function($a, $b) {
return strcmp($a['0'], $b['0']);;
}); //this sorts on key 0 in your case title:
//print_r($new_book_array); // has it sorted properly
for display:
loop again
echo '<table><tr><th>Title</th><th>Author</th><th>Pub Date</th><th>ISBN</th></tr>';
foreach($new_book_array as $book){
//print_r($book); //is it each indervidual book array with 4 elements
echo '<tr><td>'.$book[0].'</td><td>'.$book[1].'</td><td>'.$book[2].'</td><td>'.$book[3].'</td></tr>';
}
echo '</table>';