Check if an array of an array contains a certain string

Question

I'm checking to make sure an array of arrays does not contain certain strings before adding any new child arrays to the parent array

I want to make sure that if an array with the same website and condition exists a new child array will not be added to the parent array.

e.g. in this example the $newArr must not be inserted in to the array $arr because their already exists an array with the same website and condition.

$arr = array(
   array(
      'website' => 'amazon',
      'price' => 20,
      'location' => 'uk',
      'link' => '...',
      'condition' => 'new'
   ),
   array(
      'website' => 'abe',
      'price' => 20,
      'location' => 'uk',
      'link' => '...',
      'condition' => 'new'
   )
);

$newArr = array(
      'website' => 'amazon',
      'price' => 60,
      'location' => 'uk',
      'link' => '...',
      'condition' => 'new'
   )

I'm looking for an easy solution as using the function in_array on the parent array is not enough.

code so far

$arr = array();

foreach($table->find('tr.result') as $row){

   if(($website = $row->find('a img',0)) 
      && ($price = $row->find('span.results-price a',0))
      && ($location = $row->find('.results-explanatory-text-Logo'))                     
      && ($link = $row->find('a',0))){                  

      $website = str_replace( array('.gif','.jpg','.png'), '', basename($website->src));
      $price = floatval(trim(str_replace(',', '', $price->innertext), "&pound;")); 
      $location = "uk";         
      $link = $link->href;

      $arr[] = array(
         'website' => $website,
         'price' => $price,
         'location' => $location,
         'link' => $link,
         'condition' => 'new'
      );
   }            
}

David Harkness · Accepted Answer · 2012-08-11 01:18:29Z

1

You loop over $arr each time to look for $website and $condition (always 'new'?) or you can keep a secondary array of the found keys. If you're starting with an empty $arr each time, the second approach will work and be faster.

$arr = array();
$keys = array();

foreach($table->find('tr.result') as $row){

   if(...){                  
      ...
      $condition = 'new'; // set as needed

      // track seen keys
      $key = $website . '|' . $condition; // assumes neither field contains '|'
      if (!isset($keys[$key])) {
         $keys[$key] = true;
         $arr[] = array(...);
      }
   }            
}

answered Aug 11, 2012 at 1:18

David Harkness

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Comments

HandiworkNYC.com · Accepted Answer · 2012-08-11 01:22:10Z

1

I hope the comments in the below code speak for themselves... I'm not a PHP pro, and this is probably not the most elegant way, but I believe the logic makes sense. Obviously the $new_array object has some variables that aren't declared but it's for example only.

I hope that helps and that no one down votes me :)

<?php
    // Original array
    $arr = array();

    foreach($result as $row) {
        // Get the new array as an object first so we can check whether to add to the loop
        $new_array = array(
            'website' => $website,
            'price' => $price,
            'location' => $location,
            'link' => $link,
            'condition' => 'new'
        );

        // If the original array is empty there's no point in looping through it
        if(!empty($arr)) {
            foreach($arr as $child) {
                // Check through each item of the original array
                foreach($new_array as $compare) {
                    // Compare each item in the new array against the original array
                    if(in_array($compare, $child)) {
                        // if there's a match, the new array will not get added
                        continue;
                    }
                }

            }   
        }

            // If there's no match, the new array gets added
        $arr[] = $new_array;
    }
?>

answered Aug 11, 2012 at 1:22

HandiworkNYC.com

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2 Comments

mk_89 Over a year ago

looks like a standard search, not elegant but I will probably use this if nothing else comes up

David Harkness Over a year ago

You're comparing only the values, so two different keys that map to the same value will trigger a "match", though unlikely given that each type of element is pretty distinct. But more importantly, continue will have zero effect there since it's the last statement of the enclosing foreeach loop. Thus $new_array will be added to $arr every time.

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