accessing specific elements of arrays in a foreach loop - php

Question

I apologize if this is a very simple question - I've read through tons of posts here, but my question is syntactically very hard to search for, so I haven't found an answer yet.
I have a json array that's output from a company's API:
[Result] => Array
(
[cData] => Array
(
[0] => Array
(
[Reqa] => ABCD
[Reqb] =>
[Reqc] => Plus
[dto] => Array
(
[0] => Array
(
[ComID] => 43292392
[Comment] => Dave
)
[1] => Array
(
[ComID] => 43292392
[Comment] => Bob
)
)
[XREFSearchOperation] => Exact
)
[1] => Array
(
[Reqa] => BCDE
[Reqb] =>
[Reqc] => A
[dto] => Array
(
[0] => Array
(
[ComID] => 19331186
[Comment] => Mike
)
[1] => Array
(
[ComID] => 19331186
[Comment] => Roger
)
)
[XREFSearchOperation] => Starts With
)
[2] => Array
(
[Reqa] => QQDT
[Reqb] =>
)
)
)
)
and I'm trying to access the [ComID] and [Comment] elements, if they exist, inside of a foreach loop and assign it to the variable $y
So far I have:
foreach ($json['Result']['cData']['dto'] as $i) {
$y = "{$i['ComID']}|{$i['Comment']}";
}
but this gives me zero results. I understand WHY, because in between ['cData'] and ['dto'] are [0], [1], [2] etc.. elements, and I don't know how to add a qualifier for those into the loop.
Update
This code works for most of the json response:
foreach ($json['Result']['cData'] as $i) {
if(array_key_exists('dto', $i)) {
foreach ($i['dto'] as $j) {
$y = "{$j['ComID']}|{$j['Comment']}";
} else {
}
}
However - I'm having one more small issue. If there are multiple [dto] responses, you'll have [dto][0][ComID] then [dto][1][ComID] and [dto][2][ComID], (like in the example above,) but if there's only ONE response, you'll have [dto][ComID] as there's no need for that middle array.
I tried writing if(array_key_exists('dto[0]' to execute one, then an else statement in the event dto[0] doesn't exist, but that didn't work. I need a way of NOT executing a foreach loop if there is no array underneath it to "foreachicize". Is there an if/else statement I can write to accommodate this?

Answer 1

Probably need a nested foreach:
foreach ($json['Result']['cData'] as $i) {
foreach($i['dto'] as $j) {
$y[] = "{$j['ComID']}|{$j['Comment']}"; //need an array here
}
}
For the update to the question. Check if $i['dto'][0] exists:
foreach ($json['Result']['cData'] as $i) {
if(isset($i['dto'][0]))) {
foreach($i['dto'] as $j) {
$y[] = "{$j['ComID']}|{$j['Comment']}";
}
} else {
$y[] = "{$j['ComID']}|{$j['Comment']}";
}
}
There might be a better way but I'm headed out.

Answer 2

Another approach:
foreach($json['Result']['cData'] as $cData)
{
foreach($cData['dto'] as $dto)
{
if(array_key_exists('ComID', $dto) && array_key_exists('Comment', $dto))
{
$y = "{$dto['ComID']}|{$dto['Comment']}";
}
}
}