Exploding an array for an email message - php

Question

I am attempting to generate a weekly email to users of my site that lists locations that have added new information. When someone adds information, a table receives two numbers, one for the state and the second for the county. The first step of my cron job is to take the numbers and convert them to county, state format (Alameda, California for example). At the end of each conversion I added a | to be used as a delimiter. This part works perfectly. Next I loop through each user to send this information via email but this part does not work. What I end up with is the word array instead of my county, state format. What am I missing?
This is the code that performs the 1st step, which works just fine:
$i = 0;
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
$SID = $row['SID'];
$CID = $row['CID'];
$states = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM State WHERE ID = '$SID'");
while ($state = mysql_fetch_array($states)) {
$statename = $state['Name'];
}
$countys = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM County WHERE ID = '$CID'");
while ($county = mysql_fetch_array($countys)) {
$countyname = $county['Name'];
}
$locations = '<a href="http://hammerpins.net/display.php?state=' . $SID .' &county=' . $CID .'" >' . "$countyname, $statename ". '</a>' . "|";
$i = $i + 1;
}
This is the code that I am using to explode the array into the county, state format, which does not function properly. Instead I get the word array.
$locals = explode("|", $locations);
$locals is used in the email message as the list of new information. Please point me in the right direction. Thanks

Answer 1

explode will give you array
$pizza = "piece1 piece2 piece3 piece4 piece5 piece6";
$pieces = explode(" ", $pizza);
echo $pieces[0]; // piece1
echo $pieces[1]; // piece2
so when you use explode function, it will explode string in to array
in your case .. write
$locals = explode("|", $locations);
echo "<pre>";print_r($locals);echo "</pre>";
and you will have exact idea and it will solve your problem

Answer 2

First, what is the purpose of $i?
Second, I think you want to concatenate $locations:
// This overwrites the variable - this is what you are doing
// at the end $locations will be the one single last link
$locations = '<a href="ht
// This adds to / concatenates - giving you a long strong of many links
$locations .= '<a href="ht
// ^ Note the period.
Third, explode does take a string and turns it into an array.
If you're making a long string, why would you want to explode it back into the parts you constructed it from?
I would suggest storing your states, countys, and constructed links in arrays. Then you can use the contents of those arrays at will to create your emails.
To look at what's in an array use print_r() or var_dump(). You can loop over arrays with foreach().
<?php
$i = 0;
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
$SID = $row['SID'];
$CID = $row['CID'];
$states = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM State WHERE ID = '$SID'");
while ($state = mysql_fetch_array($states)) {
// There had better only be ONE statename per SID or you lose info!
$user_array[$i]['statename'] = $state['Name'];
}
$countys = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM County WHERE ID = '$CID'");
while ($county = mysql_fetch_array($countys)) {
// There had better only be ONE countyname per CID or you lose info!
$user_array[$i]['countyname'] = $county['Name'];
}
$user_array[$i]['link'] = '<a href="http://hammerpins.net/display.php?state=' . $SID .' &county=' . $CID .'" >' . "{$user_array[$i]['countyname']}, {$user_array[$i]['statename']} ". '</a>';
++$i; // add one to i
}
// Show the arrays:
echo "<pre>";
print_r($user_array);
echo "</pre>";
?>
The above gives you an array like
Array
(
[0] => Array
(
[statename] => CA
[countyname] => San Bernardino
[link] => <a href="blah...
)
[1] => Array
(
[statename] => OR
[countyname] => Multnomah
[link] => <a href="yada...
)
)
To use the array just do
foreach ($user_array as $single_user_item) {
echo $single_user_item['link'];
}