php facebook people search how to remove repeat value? - php

Question

https://graph.facebook.com/search?q=tom&type=user&access_token=2227470867|2.AQD2FG3bzBMEiDV3.3600.1307905200.0-100001799728875|LowLfLcqSZ9YKujFEpIrlFNVZPQ
how to avoid repeat name in facebook people search? in the json code, there have 2 Thomas Lee. Thanks.
foreach ($status_list['data'] as $data) {
echo $data['name']; // not print the same name.
}

Answer 1

$names = Array();
foreach ($status_list['data'] as $data) {
$names[] = $data['name'];
}
$names = array_unique($names); // not print the same name.
foreach ($names as $name) {
echo $name;
}

Answer 2

Here's a fast mashup of how you remove duplicates:
<?php
function existsInArray($list, $key, $value){
foreach($list as $lkey => $lvalue){
if($lvalue[$key] == $value){
return true;
}
}
return false;
}
$sortedUsers = array();
foreach($status_list['data'] as $data){
if(!existsInArray($sortedUsers, "id", $data["id"])){
$sortedUsers[] = $data;
}
}
This will go through the array och users, check if each item exist with the same id in the sorted array. If it doesn't exist, it will be added to the sorted array. Then you have $sortedUsers which doesn't contain any duplicates.
Note: However, this is just proof of concept code. So there are probably a lot of performance optimization that could be done. Also, there are probably some built in functionality to which can do this with less user defined code. Why I showed this is to just explain the process.
Edit: Since this answer got accepted I feel obligated to show something which is a little more high quality than proof of concept code. Also because it got mentioned in the comments that it was inefficient.
So here's easy fix to make this much faster:
$sortedUsers = array();
foreach($status_list['data'] as $data){
$sortedUsers[$data["id"]] = $data;
}
This way it will just overwrite the duplicates and will take away the whole process of comparing each item. In worst case this will be O(n) where as the proof of concept code was O(n ^ (n / 2)) in worst case.