How to make a "distinct" detection on a foreach loop - php

Question

At this time I have this very complex query that I loop through and I get something like this:
List of Challenges:
TEAM A
- Challenge 1
TEAM A
- Challenge 4
TEAM A
- Challege 6
And I want to change to something like:
TEAM A
- Challenge 1
- Challenge 4
- Challenge 6
My question is, since the query is a very complex one, maybe I could do this inside the loop but, if that's the case, how can we achieve something like that?
Can I ask an example case so that I can use, in order to solve this issue?
Thanks a lot,
MEM
UPDATE:
The query is something like this:
Translated:
public function listachallengesPendentes()
{
$select = $this->getAdapter()->select();
$select->from(array("e"=>"teams"),array('name'));
$select->join(array("de"=>"challengeperteam"),"e.cod_team = de.cod_teamFk",array());
$select->join(array("d"=>"challenges"),"d.cod_challenge = de.cod_challengeFk",array('title'));
$select->columns(array("e.cod_team"
,"name_team"=>"e.name"
,"d.cod_challenge"
,"name_challenge"=>"d.title"
,"d.details"
,"d.score"
,"category"=>"d.cod_categoryFk"
,"de.proof"
,"de.date_concluded"
,"de.cod_challenge_team"
));
$select->where("de.status = 0");
$select->order(array('e.cod_team DESC', 'de.cod_challenge_team DESC'));
return $this->getAdapter()->fetchAll($select);
}
So I need to add a distinct some part :s :D ?
The foreach actually is pretty basic:
foreach ($challenges as $d){
//display the name:
echo $d['name_team'];
...
}
UPDATE 2
The clean query (not tested):
SELECT e.name
,d.cod_team
,d.cod_challenge
,d.title
,d.details
,d.score
,de.proof
,de.date_concluded
,de.cod_challenge_team
FROM teams e
INNER JOIN challengeperteam de ON de.cod_teamFk = e.cod_team
INNER JOIN challenges d ON d.cod_challenge = de.cod_challengeFk
WHERE de.status = 0
ORDER BY e.cod_team DESC, de.cod_challenge_team DESC;

Answer 1

Something along the lines of:
$current_team = null;
foreach($challenges as $challenge){
if($current_team != $challenge->team){
$current_team = $challenge->team;
echo $current_team, "\n";
}
echo $challenge->challenge_name, "\n";
}

Answer 2

At a very basic level, ie in the loop, you can just detect if the TEAM A variable is equal to the current (previous) value, and if so, don't print it a second time. This relies on the result set being sorted on the TEAM A column.
However, you can also do this in the SQL query, so if you can provide the current SQL Query, I can explain how you'd update it.

Answer 3

you could store the array results in a multi-dimensional array like so:
$query_Challenges = "SELECT `Team`,`Challenges` FROM YourTable";
$Challenges = mysql_query($query_Challenges, $dbconnection) or die(mysql_error());
$row_Challenges = mysql_fetch_assoc($Challenges);
$challengeResults = array();
do{
if(!array_key_exists($row_Challenges['cod_team'])){
$challengeResults[$row_Challenges['cod_team']] = array();
}
$challengeResults[$row_Challenges['cod_team']][] = $row_Challenges['cod_challenge_team'];
}while($row_Challenges = mysql_fetch_assoc($Challenges));
EDIT
looking at your query statement, the data should be already sorted properly by your ORDER clause, so if you just need not repeatedly print the team as shown in codeblock 2, then something like:
$team = '';
do {
if($team != $row_Challenges['cod_team']){
echo "TEAM $row_Challenges['cod_team']<br/>";
$team = $row_Challenges['cod_team'];
}
echo " - $row_Challenges['cod_challenge_team']<br />";
}while($row_Challenges = mysql_fetch_assoc($Challenges));
you could easily substitute a foreach for the do loop, as long as there is a variable used as the "current team" and an if statement used to say "dont print the next team name unless its different than the current team name"