Echo all json_encoded rows - php

Question

I'm trying to loop through my database and output all rows with a match to the joined table.
I have the following two tables:
quest_items stores all data related to an item:
join_questitems stores association between player ID and the items that player has:
JS: pass in all the necessary info to query the table...
$.getJSON("phpscripts.php", {
"_player" : Player,
"_playerID" : UserID
},
function(returned_data) {
var item_name = returned_data.item_name;
item_image = returned_data.item_image;
$(".questItems").html(item_name + ", " + item_image);
}
);
PHP:
$statsArray = array();
$qry =
'SELECT qi.*
FROM quest_items qi
LEFT JOIN join_questitems jqi ON (qi.item_id = jqi.item_id)
WHERE jqi.user_id = "' . $playerID . '"';
$result = $mysqli->query($qry) or die(mysqli_error($mysqli));
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$myrow = json_encode($row);
array_push($statsArray, $myrow);
}
$k = 0;
while ($k < count($statsArray)) {
echo $statsArray[$k];
$k++;
}
But if I just do one row, I get output, but only for one row. I need both rows:
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
echo json_encode($row);
exit;
}
$(".questItems").html(item_name + ", " + item_image) gives: rice, test/path.png
Why can't I loop through the PHP array full of json_encoded rows and output them? Do I have to set item_name and item_image as arrays and loop through the arrays?
EDIT:
$(".questItems").append(item_name + ", " + item_image) doesn't work either
network output from debugger shows rows are being output, but in the first row, my UTF-8 character, fàn, is being garbled in the client output (as you can see). This is curious, as at the top of my phpscripts.php file, I put mysqli_set_charset($mysqli, "utf8");

Answer 1

You shouldn't encode each row separately. Put all the results in an array, and then call json_encode on that array when you're done:
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$statsArray[] = $row;
}
echo json_encode($statsArray);
Then in Javascript you need to loop over the returned array:
$.getJSON("phpscripts.php", {
"_player" : Player,
"_playerID" : UserID
},
function(returned_data) {
$.each(returned_data, function(i, e) {
var item_name = e.item_name;
var item_image = e.item_image;
$(".questItems").append(item_name + ", " + item_image + "<br/>");
});
};
);

Answer 2

rather than this:
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
echo json_encode($row);
exit; //<--- this code breaks the while loop;
}
have this:
$quest_items = array();
while ($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$quest_items[] = $row;
}
echo json_encode($quest_items);
exit;
because exit triggers the script to stop(even inside loops) so you will only get the first row.