php searching in multidimensional array of unknown depth - php

Question

I try to select the data of an array that was constructed by json_decode().
In principle it is an multiarray of unknown dimension.
First of all, I want to search recursively for a value in this array. As a next step I want to get some other values of the upper dimension. So here is an example:
I search for: "2345"
....
$json[3][6]['journal']['headline']="news"
$json[3][6]['journal']['article']=2345
....
$json[8]['journal']['headline']="weather"
$json[8]['journal']['article']=2345
....
After that I want to get the value of the element headline (returning "news" and "weather")
It might be that the element 2345 can be found in different dimensions!!!

Answer 1

Someone could probably do this with a RecursiveIteratorIterator object, but I personally have a hard time with iterator objects, so here is a fairly robust system:
<?php
// This will traverse an array and find the
// value while storing the base key
class RecurseLocator
{
public static $saved = array();
public static $find;
public static $trigger;
public static function Initialize($find = false)
{
self::$find = $find;
}
public static function Recursive(array $array)
{
foreach($array as $key => $value) {
if(!isset(self::$trigger) || (isset(self::$trigger) && empty(self::$trigger))) {
if(is_numeric($key))
self::$trigger = $key;
}
if(!is_array($value)) {
if($value == self::$find) {
self::$saved[self::$trigger] = $value;
}
}
if(is_array($value)) {
$value = self::Recursive($value);
if(!is_numeric($key))
self::$trigger = "";
}
$return[$key] = $value;
}
return $return;
}
}
// This class will traverse an array searching
// for a specific key or keys
class RecurseSearch
{
public $data;
public $compare;
public function Find($array = '',$find,$recursive = true)
{
$find = (is_array($find))? implode("|",$find):$find;
if(is_array($array)) {
foreach($array as $key => $value) {
if(preg_match("/$find/",$key))
$this->compare[$key] = $value;
if($recursive == true) {
if(!is_array($value)) {
if(preg_match("/$find/",$key)) {
$this->data[$key][] = $value;
}
$array[$key] = $value;
}
else {
if(preg_match("/$find/",$key))
$this->data[$key][] = $this->Find($value,$find);
$array[$key] = $this->Find($value,$find);
}
}
else {
if(preg_match("/$find/",$key))
$this->data[$key] = $value;
}
}
$this->data = (isset($this->data))? $this->data:false;
return $this;
}
}
}
// This function just wraps the RecurseSearch class
function get_key_value($array = array(), $find = array(),$recursive = true)
{
$finder = new RecurseSearch();
return $finder->Find($array,$find,$recursive);
}
USAGE:
$json[3][6]['journal']['headline'] = "news";
$json[3][6]['journal']['article'] = 2345;
$json[8]['journal']['headline'] = "weather";
$json[8]['journal']['article'] = 2345;
$json[4][1]['journal']['headline'] = "news";
$json[4][1]['journal']['article'] = 22245;
$json[5]['journal']['headline'] = "weather";
$json[5]['journal']['article'] = 233345;
// Set the search criteria
RecurseLocator::Initialize(2345);
// Traverse the array looking for value
$arr = RecurseLocator::Recursive($json);
// If found, will be stored here
$iso = RecurseLocator::$saved;
/* $iso looks like:
Array
(
[3] => 2345
[8] => 2345
)
*/
// Loop through the $iso array
foreach($iso as $key => $value) {
// Save to new array your search results
$new[] = get_key_value($json[$key],array("headline","article"),true);
}
/* $new looks like:
Array
(
[0] => RecurseSearch Object
(
[data] => Array
(
[headline] => Array
(
[0] => news
)
[article] => Array
(
[0] => 2345
)
)
[compare] => Array
(
[headline] => news
[article] => 2345
)
)
[1] => RecurseSearch Object
(
[data] => Array
(
[headline] => Array
(
[0] => weather
)
[article] => Array
(
[0] => 2345
)
)
[compare] => Array
(
[headline] => weather
[article] => 2345
)
)
)
*/
?>
Just as a side note, the above class stores multiple found in the [data], and then stores them also in the [compare], however the [compare] will overwrite itself if multiple same-keys are found in one array where as [data] will just keep adding values.

Answer 2

just create a function for compile unknown array. try this
$json[1][6]['journal']['headline']="news";
$json[1][6]['journal']['article']=2345;
$json[3][6]['journal']['headline']="HOT";
$json[3][6]['journal']['article']=2345;
$json[8]['journal']['headline']="weather";
$json[8]['journal']['article']=2345;
$json[10]['journal']['headline']="weather";
$json[10]['journal']['article']=2345;
$GLOBALS['list_scan'] = array();
$result = array();
foreach ($json as $key => $value)
{
if (is_array($value)) {
_compile_scan($key, $value);
}
}
echo "<pre>";
print_r($GLOBALS['list_scan']);
echo "</pre>";
$search = "2345";
$keyword = "article";
$keyFinder = "headline";
foreach ($GLOBALS['list_scan'] as $key => $value)
{
if ($value == $search)
{
$addr = substr($key, 0, -(strlen($keyword))).$keyFinder;
if (!empty($GLOBALS['list_scan'][$addr]))
{
$result[] = $GLOBALS['list_scan'][$addr];
}
}
}
echo "<pre>";
print_r($result);
echo "</pre>";
function _compile_scan($index, $value)
{
$pointer =& $GLOBALS['list_scan'];
foreach ($value as $key => $val)
{
$temp = '';
$temp = $index.'|'.$key;
if (is_array($val))
{
// $pointer[$temp] = $val;
_compile_scan($temp, $val);
}
else $pointer[$temp] = $val;
}
}
output:
Array
(
[1|6|journal|headline] => news
[1|6|journal|article] => 2345
[3|6|journal|headline] => HOT
[3|6|journal|article] => 2345
[8|journal|headline] => weather
[8|journal|article] => 2345
[9|journal|headline] => Others
[9|journal|article] => 234521
)
Array
(
[0] => news
[1] => HOT
[2] => weather
)