How do I put this array into csv or excel? - php

Question

I can't figure out a way to do this and I really bad with working with arrays so I hope someone can help me.
I have array $stuck that just contains names, like this
$stuck = array('Daniel','Alex','alfredo','dina');
I am using sort to put the names in alphabetical order, like this
sort($stuck);
Now the thing is I want to put this array into a csv or excel file so the first letter of name will be the title and all the names with this letter will be under this title.
This is an example of what I am trying to accomplish

Answer 1

Here try this. I added comments between the code.
$csvArray = array();
$nameArray = array('Daniel','Alex','alfredo','dina');
//Create an array that can be used for creating the CSV
foreach($nameArray as $name)
{
$firstLetter = strtoupper(substr($name, 0,1));
$csvArray[$firstLetter][] = $name;
}
//Determine the subarray which have the must rules
$maxRuleCount = 0;
foreach($csvArray as $firstLetter => $nameArray)
{
if(count($nameArray) > $maxRuleCount)
{
$maxRuleCount = count($nameArray);
}
}
//Create the first rule (letters)
$csvContent = implode(';', array_keys($csvArray));
$csvContent .= "\r\n";
//Loop through the CSV array and create rules of the names
for($i = 0 ; $i < $maxRuleCount ; $i++)
{
foreach($csvArray as $firstLetter => $nameArray)
{
$csvContent .= #$csvArray[$firstLetter][$i].';';
}
$csvContent .= "\r\n";
}
//The hole csv content is in the $csvContent variable now
//If you want to print it you need to add the text/plain header because of the \r\n new line characters
header("Content-Type:text/plain");
echo $csvContent;
Ouput is:
D;A
Daniel;Alex;
dina;alfredo;

Answer 2

<?php
$stuck = array('Daniel','Alex','Dina','durban','eigor','alfredo','dina');
// associate names with first letters in a new array
foreach ($stuck as $name) {
$first_letter = strtoupper( substr( $name, 0, 1 ) );
$new_name_array[ $first_letter ][] = $name;
}
// store the first letter list in an array and sort it
$first_letters = array_keys( $new_name_array );
sort( $first_letters );
// sort the name lists
foreach( array_keys( $new_name_array ) as $letter ) {
sort( $new_name_array[$letter] );
}
// output csv header row
echo "'".implode( "','", $first_letters )."'\n";
// output the CSV name rows
$i = 0;
while ( true ) {
$row = array();
$is_row = false;
foreach( $first_letters as $letter ) {
$row[] = $new_name_array[ $letter ][ $i ];
if( ! empty( $new_name_array[ $letter ][ $i ] ) ) $is_row = true;
}
if( ! $is_row ) exit;
echo "'" . implode( "','", $row ) . "'\n";
$i++;
}
?>
Outputs quoted CSV:
'A','D','E'
'Alex','Daniel','eigor'
'alfredo','Dina',''
'','dina',''
'','durban',''

Answer 3

<?php
$stuck = array('Daniel','Alex','alfredo','dina', 'eigor', 'durban');
sort($stuck);
$sortedNames = array();
$maxEl = 0;
foreach ($stuck as $name) {
$name = strtolower($name);
$sortedNames[$name{0}][] = $name;
$maxEl = count($sortedNames[$name{0}]) < $maxEl ? $maxEl : count($sortedNames[$name{0}]);
}
$headers = array_keys($sortedNames);
$finalArray = array($headers);
for($i = 0; $i < $maxEl; $i++) {
$tmpRow = array();
foreach ($sortedNames as $names) {
$tmpRow[] = isset($names[$i]) ? $names[$i] : '';
}
$finalArray[] = $tmpRow;
}
$file = fopen("names.csv","w");
foreach ($finalArray as $line)
{
fputcsv($file,$line);
}
fclose($file);

Answer 4

Here is my attempt at this question:
$names = array('Daniel','Alex','alfredo','dina', 'eigor', 'falfoul', 'fiona');
natcasesort($names);
$columns = array();
foreach ($names as $name) {
$first = strtoupper(substr($name, 0, 1));
$columns[$first][] = $name;
}
// pad the columns so they all have the same number of rows
$maxRows = 0;
foreach ($columns as &$col) {
$numRows = count($col);
if ( $numRows > $maxRows) {
$maxRows = $numRows;
}
}
// pad the columns
foreach ($columns as &$column) {
$column = array_pad($column, $maxRows, '');
}
$firstLetter = array_keys($columns);
$numCols = count($firstLetter);
// transpose the columns array
$rows = array();
foreach ($columns as $csvCol) {
foreach ($csvCol as $k=>$n) {
$rows[$k][] = $n;
}
}
// pad the rows to ensure they all have the same number of
// columns
foreach ($rows as &$row) {
$row = array_pad($row, $numCols, '');
}
// add the title row to the rows
array_unshift($rows, $firstLetter);
$handle = fopen("names.csv", 'w');
foreach ($rows as $fRow) {
fputcsv($handle, $fRow);
}