Reaching the last XML element - php

Question

so I got this XML.
I got a lot of such similar blocks in XML, and I can loop through it. But how would I know how many blocks are there ?
Or how would I stop after the last block ?
Any suggestion is appreciated.
<StockBalanceOut xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dynamics/2008/01/documents/BON_StockBalanceOut" class="entity">
<_DocumentHash>f5a598f180ccdecffeb7774d58ca8743</_DocumentHash>
<AvailPhysicalAvailableQty>0</AvailPhysicalAvailableQty>
<AvailPhysicalReservedQty>0</AvailPhysicalReservedQty>
<AvailPhysicalReturnQty>0</AvailPhysicalReturnQty>
<AvailPhysicalReworkQty>0</AvailPhysicalReworkQty>
<AvailPhysicalScrapQty>0</AvailPhysicalScrapQty>
<Date>2014-09-26</Date>
<ItemId>15742-20907</ItemId>
<ItemShippingClass>Empty</ItemShippingClass>
<OnOrderQty>0</OnOrderQty>
<PhysicalInventAvailableQty>0</PhysicalInventAvailableQty>
<PhysicalInventReservedQty>0</PhysicalInventReservedQty>
<PhysicalInventReturnQty>0</PhysicalInventReturnQty>
<PhysicalInventReworkQty>0</PhysicalInventReworkQty>
<PhysicalInventScrapQty>0</PhysicalInventScrapQty>
<RecId>5637416600</RecId>
<RecVersion>1</RecVersion>
<Time>15:25:52</Time>
</StockBalanceOut>
<StockBalanceOut xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/dynamics/2008/01/documents/BON_StockBalanceOut" class="entity">
<_DocumentHash>6c6a3aa160f3ab9388f8e1b5b2fd7dc1</_DocumentHash>
<AvailPhysicalAvailableQty>99</AvailPhysicalAvailableQty>
<AvailPhysicalReservedQty>0</AvailPhysicalReservedQty>
<AvailPhysicalReturnQty>0</AvailPhysicalReturnQty>
<AvailPhysicalReworkQty>0</AvailPhysicalReworkQty>
<AvailPhysicalScrapQty>0</AvailPhysicalScrapQty>
<Date>2014-09-26</Date>
<ItemId>21234-29752</ItemId>
<ItemShippingClass>Empty</ItemShippingClass>
<OnOrderQty>0</OnOrderQty>
<PhysicalInventAvailableQty>99</PhysicalInventAvailableQty>
<PhysicalInventReservedQty>0</PhysicalInventReservedQty>
<PhysicalInventReturnQty>0</PhysicalInventReturnQty>
<PhysicalInventReworkQty>0</PhysicalInventReworkQty>
<PhysicalInventScrapQty>0</PhysicalInventScrapQty>
<RecId>5637416601</RecId>
<RecVersion>1</RecVersion>
<Time>15:25:52</Time>
</StockBalanceOut>

Answer 1

From your XML, I got this information.
There are multiple 'blocks' for <StockBalanceOut>, you can access each one by :-
$objectOfXMLFile->StockBalanceOut[0];
$objectOfXMLFile->StockBalanceOut[1];
To reach till the end you can run a while loop. If any index (suppose 10 doesn't exist) for StockBalanceOut doesn't exist, then it will return null.
$counter=0; //run from 0
while(!is_null($xmlOBJ->StockBalanceOut[$counter]))
{
//do anything here
$counter++;
}

Answer 2

I would look at trying something like this. To save you the link trip, here is some example code to get you started.
<?php
$xml = <<<EOF
<people>
<person name="Person 1">
<child/>
<child/>
<child/>
</person>
<person name="Person 2">
<child/>
<child/>
<child/>
<child/>
<child/>
</person>
</people>
EOF;
$elem = new SimpleXMLElement($xml);
foreach ($elem as $person) {
printf("%s has got %d children.\n", $person['name'], $person->count());
}
?>