for each loop with json data - php

Question

I'm having a small problem while pulling tide data from the wunderground api. When I use the code below to pull the time of day for low tide I get an accurate answer one day, but a wrong answer the following day:
<?
$json_url = 'http://api.wunderground.com/api/b2b4a1ad0a889006/tide/q/NJ/Wildwood.json';
// jSON String for request
$json_string = '[http://api.wunderground.com/api/b2b4a1ad0a889006/tide/q/NJ/Wildwood.json]';
// Initializing curl
$ch = curl_init( $json_url );
// Configuring curl options
$options = array(
CURLOPT_RETURNTRANSFER => true,
);
// Setting curl options
curl_setopt_array( $ch, $options );
// Getting results
$result = curl_exec($ch); // Getting jSON result string
$parsed_json = json_decode($result);
$parsed_data->stats; //this returns
$low_tide_time = $parsed_json->tide->tideSummary[8]->date->pretty;
echo $low_tide_time;
?>
The reason for this is clear. The array key (in this case [8]) is not consistently assigned to the same tide data type (low tide) every day. So today [8] may be the array key associated with the time for low tide, but tomorrow [8] will be the array key assigned to sunrise, moonrise, etc.
Is there a way to use a for each loop to grab the time for low tide?
Thanks!

Answer 1

I check JSON format and it should works:
foreach( $parsed_json->tide->tideSummary AS $tideSummary ) {
if( $tideSummary->data->type == "Low Tide" ) {
$low_tide_time = $tideSummary->date->pretty;
echo $low_tide_time;
// you can end of foreach
break;
}
}

Answer 2

If there is something unique in the $parsed_json->tide->tideSummary Object which belongs to your requested information (like "Title: Low Tide") you could do a foreach loop and check if that value is present.
Like this
foreach ($parsed_json->tide->tideSummary AS $tideSummary) {
if ($tideSummary->title == "Low Tide") {
$LowTide = $tideSummary;
}
}
You can access the Low Tide data after that like this:
echo $LowTide->Date;
PS: Untested and no info about your JSON Format, if there is no unique information to identify Low Tide it could get tricky..