Yahoo Search API Problem - php

Question

I am having problem with the yahoo search API, sometimes it works and sometimes don't why I am getting problem with that
I am using this URL
http://api.search.yahoo.com/WebSearchService/rss/webSearch.xml?appid=yahoosearchwebrss&query=originurlextension%3Apdf+$search&adult_ok=1&start=$start
The code is given below:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
<? $search = $_GET["search"];
$replace = " "; $with = "+";
$search = str_replace($replace, $with, $search);
if ($rs =
$rss->get("http://api.search.yahoo.com/WebSearchService/rss/webSearch.xml?appid=yahoosearchwebrss&query=originurlextension%3Apdf+$search&adult_ok=1&start=$start")
)
{ }
// Go through the list powered by the search engine listed and get
// the data from each <item>
$colorCount="0";
foreach($rs['items'] as $item) { // Get the title of result
$title = $item['title']; // Get the description of the result
$description = $item['description']; // Get the link eg amazon.com
$urllink = $item['guid'];
if($colorCount%2==0) {
$color = ROW1_COLOR;
} else {
$color = ROW2_COLOR;
}
include "resulttemplate.php"; $colorCount++;
echo "\n";
}
?>
Sometimes it gives results and sometimes don't. I get this error usually
Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home4/thesisth/public_html/pdfsearchmachine/classes/rss.php on line 14
Can anyone help..

Answer 1

The error Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home4/thesisth/public_html/pdfsearchmachine/classes/rss.php on line 14 means the foreach construct did not receive an iterable (usually an array). Which in your case would mean the $rs['items'] is empty... maybe the search returned no results?
I would recommended adding some checks to the results of $rss->get("...") first, and also having an action for when the request fails or returns no results:
<?php
$search = isset($_GET["search"]) ? $_GET["search"] : "default search term";
$start = "something here"; // This was left out of your original code
$colorCount = "0";
$replace = " ";
$with = "+";
$search = str_replace($replace, $with, $search);
$rs = $rss->get("http://api.search.yahoo.com/WebSearchService/rss/webSearch.xml?appid=yahoosearchwebrss&query=originurlextension%3Apdf+$search&adult_ok=1&start=$start");
if (isset($rs) && isset($rs['items'])) {
foreach ($rs['items'] as $item) {
$title = $item['title']; // Get the title of the result
$description = $item['description']; // Get the description of the result
$urllink = $item['guid']; // Get the link eg amazon.com
$color = ($colorCount % 2) ? ROW2_COLOR : ROW1_COLOR;
include "resulttemplate.php";
echo "\n";
$colorCount++;
}
}
else {
echo "Could not find any results for your search '$search'";
}
Other changes:
$start was not declared before your $rss->get("...") call
compounded the $color if/else clause into a ternary operation with fewer comparisons
I wasn't sure what the purpose of the if ($rs = $rss->get("...")) { } was, so I removed it.
I would also recommend using require instead of include as it will cause a fatal error if resulttemplate.php doesn't exist, which in my opinion is a better way to detect bugs than PHP Warnings which will continue execution. However I don't know you whole situation so it might not be of great use.
Hope that helps!
Cheers