Create an array from an RSS description

GixerJas · January 9, 2007

Hi,
I'm a bit of a noobie at php and I'm looking for a simple solution to separate out the values from a single rss description. The feed that I'm trying to breakdown is the BBC weather feed,

[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?id=3737.xml]http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/5day.shtml?id=3737.xml[/url]

[color=blue]<description>The forecast for Marazion (TR17), United Kingdom on Tuesday: light rain. Max Temp: 14°C (57°F), Min Temp: 10°C (50°F), Wind Direction: SW, Wind Speed: 33mph, Visibility: good, Pressure: 1004mb, Humidity: 83%, UV risk: low, Pollution: low, Sunrise: 08:19GMT, Sunset: 16:36GMT</description>[/color]

I'm trying to separate the elements of the description tag so that I can display them individually i.e. Max Temp: 10[sup]o[/sup]C. It looks, to me, like it could be broken into an array, and the individual parts asigned to $trings but I'm not sure where to start.

The php rss reader script that I'm using is

[color=blue]<?php

set_time_limit(0);

$file = "http://feeds.bbc.co.uk/weather/feeds/rss/5day/id/3737.xml";

$rss_channel = array();
$currently_writing = "";
$main = "";
$item_counter = 0;

function startElement($parser, $name, $attrs) {
global $rss_channel, $currently_writing, $main;
switch($name) {
case "RSS":
case "RDF:RDF":
case "ITEMS":
$currently_writing = "";
break;
case "CHANNEL":
$main = "CHANNEL";
break;
case "IMAGE":
$main = "IMAGE";
$rss_channel["IMAGE"] = array();
break;
case "ITEM":
$main = "ITEMS";
break;
default:
$currently_writing = $name;
break;
}
}

function endElement($parser, $name) {
global $rss_channel, $currently_writing, $item_counter;
$currently_writing = "";
if ($name == "ITEM") {
$item_counter++;
}
}

function characterData($parser, $data) {
global $rss_channel, $currently_writing, $main, $item_counter;
if ($currently_writing != "") {
switch($main) {
case "CHANNEL":
if (isset($rss_channel[$currently_writing])) {
$rss_channel[$currently_writing] .= $data;
} else {
$rss_channel[$currently_writing] = $data;
}
break;
case "IMAGE":
if (isset($rss_channel[$main][$currently_writing])) {
$rss_channel[$main][$currently_writing] .= $data;
} else {
$rss_channel[$main][$currently_writing] = $data;
}
break;
case "ITEMS":
if (isset($rss_channel[$main][$item_counter][$currently_writing])) {
$rss_channel[$main][$item_counter][$currently_writing] .= $data;
} else {
print ("rss_channel[$main][$item_counter][$currently_writing] = $data<br>");
$rss_channel[$main][$item_counter][$currently_writing] = $data;
}
break;
}
}
}

$xml_parser = xml_parser_create();
xml_set_element_handler($xml_parser, "startElement", "endElement");
xml_set_character_data_handler($xml_parser, "characterData");
if (!($fp = fopen($file, "r"))) {
die("could not open XML input");
}

while ($data = fread($fp, 4096)) {
if (!xml_parse($xml_parser, $data, feof($fp))) {
die(sprintf("XML error: %s at line %d",
xml_error_string(xml_get_error_code($xml_parser)),
xml_get_current_line_number($xml_parser)));
}
}
xml_parser_free($xml_parser);

// output as HTML
print ("<html><head><title>PHP RSS Reader</title></head><body>");
if (isset($rss_channel["IMAGE"])) {
print ("<a href=\"" . $rss_channel["LINK"] . "\" target=\"_blank\"><img border=\"0\" src=\"" . $rss_channel["IMAGE"]["URL"] . "\" align=\"middle\" alt=\"" . $rss_channel["IMAGE"]["TITLE"] . "\"></a>  <font size=\"5\">" . $rss_channel["TITLE"] . "</font><br><br>");
} else {
print ("<font size=\"5\">" . $rss_channel["TITLE"] . "</font><br><br>");
}
print ("<i>" . $rss_channel["DESCRIPTION"] . "</i><br><br>");
if (isset($rss_channel["ITEMS"])) {
if (count($rss_channel["ITEMS"]) > 0) {
for($i = 0;$i < count($rss_channel["ITEMS"]);$i++) {
print ("\n<table width=\"100%\" border=\"1\"><tr><td width=\"100%\"><a href=\"" . $rss_channel["ITEMS"][$i]["LINK"] . "\" target=\"_blank\"><h2>" . $rss_channel["ITEMS"][$i]["TITLE"] . "</h2></a></b>");
print ("<i>" . html_entity_decode($rss_channel["ITEMS"][$i]["DESCRIPTION"]) . "</i>");
print ("</td></tr></table><br>");
}
} else {
print ("<b>There are no articles in this feed.</b>");
}
}
print ("</body></html>");
?>[/color]

Any help or a nudge in the right direction would be much appreciated.

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Create an array from an RSS description

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