foreach

[supermerc]

Could someone explain to me how foreach works?

 

I have a curl script that gets a page then with the page I do a preg_match_all to find some data

 

preg_match_all('~<td style="padding-left:25px;" align="left">Sigil</td>\s*<td><a href="profile\.php\?id=([^"]+)">([^<]*)<~', $data, $matches);

 

I get data in $matches[1] and $matches[2]

 

And I want to do a foreach statement so separate them all so for each pair of 1 and 2 I can do something with them.

 

So if someone could explain me how it works. I tried:

 

foreach($matches as $array) {

foreach($array as $match) {

 

and i got weird letters and numbers as my variables and it wasnt the case,

 

then I tried:

 

foreach($matches as $k=>$match)

 

And it got me something else that was weird

 

so if someone could explain it to me so I finally understand how it works it would help a lot.

 

 

[flyhoney]

To start, maybe you should do a print_r on your array, that way you can clearly see the structure of the array.

 

[supermerc]

I did do that

 

Array ( [0] => Array ( [0] => Sigil BabyBrutes<  [1] => Sigil PotHunting<  [2] => Sigil PotHunting1<  [3] => Sigil PotHuntingFIRE<  [4] => Sigil PotArcane1<  [5] => Sigil PotArcane2<  [6] => Sigil PotHoly<  [7] => Sigil babykillerv6<  [8] => Sigil PotKinetic2<  [9] => Sigil PotKinetic<  [10] => Sigil PotShadow2<  [11] => Sigil PotShadow1<  [12] => Sigil PotShadow<  [13] => Sigil PotHoly2<  [14] => Sigil PotHoly1<  [15] => Sigil PotKinetic1<  [16] => Sigil bloodyslet<  [17] => Sigil Bloodieke<  [18] => Sigil Weezer<  [19] => Sigil Bruce<  [20] => Sigil xKiLLeR13x<  [21] => Sigil BabyGovernment<  [22] => Sigil BabyCobalt<  [23] => Sigil BabyDest<  [24] => Sigil BabyLifeforces<  [25] => Sigil BabySoulgems<  [26] => Sigil BabyNoc<  [27] => Sigil babykillerv4<  [28] => Sigil babykillerv5<  [29] => Sigil BabyCrewstones<  ) [1] => Array ( [0] => 22829 [1] => 24039 [2] => 24040 [3] => 24041 [4] => 24044 [5] => 24046 [6] => 24051 [7] => 99876 [8] => 24061 [9] => 24059 [10] => 24057 [11] => 24056 [12] => 24054 [13] => 24053 [14] => 24052 [15] => 24060 [16] => 6380 [17] => 6381 [18] => 6394 [19] => 6396 [20] => 6650 [21] => 10769 [22] => 8407 [23] => 10771 [24] => 10773 [25] => 10775 [26] => 10774 [27] => 99874 [28] => 99875 [29] => 10832 ) [2] => Array ( [0] => BabyBrutes [1] => PotHunting [2] => PotHunting1 [3] => PotHuntingFIRE [4] => PotArcane1 [5] => PotArcane2 [6] => PotHoly [7] => babykillerv6 [8] => PotKinetic2 [9] => PotKinetic [10] => PotShadow2 [11] => PotShadow1 [12] => PotShadow [13] => PotHoly2 [14] => PotHoly1 [15] => PotKinetic1 [16] => bloodyslet [17] => Bloodieke [18] => Weezer [19] => Bruce [20] => xKiLLeR13x [21] => BabyGovernment [22] => BabyCobalt [23] => BabyDest [24] => BabyLifeforces [25] => BabySoulgems [26] => BabyNoc [27] => babykillerv4 [28] => babykillerv5 [29] => BabyCrewstones ) )

[allenskd]

To do a foreach you must know the data residing in your arrays therefore you need to start var_dump()ing your array to know the structure.

 

foreach iterates an array, iterates = lets say there are 8 keys with values stored in an array so foreach goes from 0 to 7 (do note that arrays always starts at 0 unless its a custom one)

 

supposing we have

$array = array('1','2','3','4'); //The count would be 3 
var_dump($array);

in an array a key starts with zero (yes I'm repeating myself)

 

So, imagine this

 

0 = 1

1 = 2

2 = 3

3 = 4

 

Now when we want to do a foreach

 

foreach($array as $key => $value) {
// foreach is a loop that will stop at the end of an array
echo "Key: ".$key ".PHP_EOL;
echo "Value: ".$value."<br />".PHP_EOL;
}

 

[wildteen88]

When using print_r use it like so

echo '<pre>'.print_r($matches, true).'</pre>';

 

This will make the structure of your array more clear.

 

Can you also explain what are trying to do with your code?

[Yesideez]

As suggested by flyhoney - print_r will show you the structure of the array so you have an idea of what foreach is running through.

 

Let's take a single dimensional array as an example, one containing a list of 5 names (adam, peter, paul, robert, jake)

$arrNames=array('adam','peter','paul','robert','jake');

 

Now we'll use foreach to run through the array sending some text to the browser:

foreach ($arrNames as $name) {
  echo 'Hello '.$name.'<br>';
}

 

As you can see foreach runs through the array passing the elements in turn as $name and is the same as:

for ($i=0;$i<count($arrNames);++$i) {
  echo 'Hello '.$arrNames[$i].'<br>';
}

 

Let's say we have an indexed array - the indexes are the names and the values are their age:

$arrAges=array('adam' => 18,'peter' => 21,'paul' => 35,'robert' => 65,'jake' => 14);

 

Now we can use foreach to run through each element accessing the index and value:

foreach ($arrAges as $key => $value) {
  echo $key.' is '.$value.' years old<br>';
}

 

Home that helps.

[thebadbad]

And I want to do a foreach statement so separate them all so for each pair of 1 and 2 I can do something with them.

 

You can add a fourth parameter to preg_match_all(), PREG_SET_ORDER, to order the subpatterns together in arrays. Then loop through each set:

 

<?php
foreach ($matches as $array) {
//$array[1] is the grabbed ID
//$array[2] is the grabbed corresponding name
}
?>

[supermerc]

And I want to do a foreach statement so separate them all so for each pair of 1 and 2 I can do something with them.

 

You can add a fourth parameter to preg_match_all(), PREG_SET_ORDER, to order the subpatterns together in arrays. Then loop through each set:

 

<?php
foreach ($matches as $array) {
//$array[1] is the grabbed ID
//$array[2] is the grabbed corresponding name
}
?>

 

Can you elaborate on "You can add a fourth parameter to preg_match_all(), PREG_SET_ORDER, to order the subpatterns together in arrays." PLease

[MatthewJ]

preg_match_all('~<td style="padding-left:25px;" align="left">Sigil</td>\s*<td><a href="profile\.php\?id=([^"]+)">([^<]*)<~', $data, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER)

[thebadbad]

Use

 

preg_match_all('~<td style="padding-left:25px;" align="left">Sigil</td>\s*<td><a href="profile\.php\?id=([^"]+)">([^<]*)<~', $data, $matches, PREG_SET_ORDER);

and then use the foreach loop I posted to loop through each set of IDs/names.

 

Edit: Matthew beat me to it..