Array to html table

[aka Robbie]

I'm trying to take an array and turn it into an html table where the number of columns can be altered. Each number appears in a seperate cell. The code I have reached is:

$input = array('one', 'two', 'three', 'four', 'five', 'six', 'seven', 'eight', 'nine', 'ten');
$cols = 5;
    
    echo "<table border=\"5\" cellpadding=\"10\">";

    for ($i=0; $i < count($input); $i++)
    {
    echo "<tr>";
        for ($c=0; $c<$cols; $c++)
        {
        echo "<td>$input[$i]</td>";
        }
    echo "</tr>";
    }
        
    echo "</table>"; 

But instead of it looking like:

one two three four five
six seven eight nine ten

It looks like:

one one one one one
two two two two two
three three three three three
four four four four four
five five five five five
six six six six six
seven seven seven seven seven
eight eight eight eight eight
nine nine nine nine nine
ten ten ten ten ten

Where am I going wrong?

[djr33]

for () {
--for () {
--}
}

The inner loop is executed in its entirety each time the outer loop runs once.

So, you get one of the outer loop (ie a single number) run through the inner loop fully-- outputting an entire row of that number.

You can't do this just with two loops. You'll need a bit more math than that. But nothing too complex.

Here's the simplest solution I can think of:

$input = array('one', 'two', 'three', 'four', 'five', 'six', 'seven', 'eight', 'nine', 'ten');
$cols = 5;
    
    echo "<table border=\"5\" cellpadding=\"10\">";

    for ($i=0; $i < count($input); $i++)
    {
    echo "<tr>";
        for ($c=0; $c<$cols; $c++)
        {
        echo "<td>$input[$i+$c]</td>";
        }
    echo "</tr>";
    $i += $c;
    }
        
    echo "</table>"; 

Note $i+$c.

There are a couple other ways as well, such as using $c%$cols, which would give the remainder of $c/$cols, which should work for you as the $c value, then just using $c value for the numbers. (Or replace $c with $i in the last sentence if that makes more sense-- you'd only have one.)


Also, though it doesn't apply so easily in this case, you should look into foreach() loops.

foreach($array as $item) {
echo $item;
}

foreach($array as $key => $item) {
echo $key.': '.$item;
}


By the way, using "$array[$item]" hasn't always worked for me, though that may be more the case with strings, like "$array['item']".
End the quotes, and use a dot to join the parts, and that will likely run smoother in at least some cases. I'm not sure about the specifics.
"something".$array[$item]."something";

[Twey]

<?php if(count($input)) { ?>
<table>
<?php for($i = 0; $i < count($input); ++$i) { ?>
<?php if(!$i) { ?>
  <tr>
<?php } else if(!($i % 5)) { ?>
  </tr>
  <tr>
<?php } ?>
    <td><?php echo $input[$i]; ?></td>
<?php } ?>
  </tr>
</table>
<?php } ?>

[aka Robbie]

Thanks for your replies guys.

Twey - based on your answer how would I modify it so the table appears as:

one six
two seven
three eight
four nine
five ten

[djr33]

$i % 5... change that to the number you want, like 2.


Twey, I understand breaking out of PHP for some long chunks of code, but single lines? Eek. You have more PHP tags now than you had echo statements.

[Twey]

Heh, I started looking at this issue in Lisp, spent a fair while figuring it out (I'm just learning Lisp and I'm pretty bad with this kind of array arithmetic anyway), then switched back to my browser and remembered that there was actually a reason I was playing with it.

(defun splitarr (grp arr)
  (apply #'mapcar
    (append '(list)
      (loop for j from 0 to (- grp 1) collecting
        (loop for i in arr when (= j (mod i grp)) collecting i)))))

<?php
  function splitarr($grp, $arr) {
    $r = array();
    foreach($arr as $k => $v)
      $r[floor($k / $grp)][] = $v;
    return $r;
  }
?>
<table>
<?php foreach(splitarr(2, $input) as $row) { ?>
  <tr>
<?php foreach($row as $cell) { ?>
    <td><?php echo $cell; ?></td>
<?php } ?>
  </tr>
<?php } ?>
</table>

[aka Robbie]

But that appears to give me two rows instead of two columns. How do I use:

$cols = 2; 

so that changing this number to 3, 4 or 5 etc will change the number of columns?

[Twey]

Whoops, I meant floor($k / $grp) not $k % $grp. Edited.

The first parameter passed to splitarr() is the number of elements to put in each group. Change it as you like.

Twey, I understand breaking out of PHP for some long chunks of code, but single lines? Eek. You have more PHP tags now than you had echo statements.

Yes, but the output's neater (unless I filled my echoed HTML up with \ns and \ts). Personally, I'd rather use Smarty or Django's template system. A proper templating system is much neater than PHP's default intermixed code and presentation.

[djr33]

echo '<table>
	<tr>
		<td>
			&nbsp;
		</td>
	</tr>
</table>';

//shrug

[Twey]

Eight spaces per level?

Doesn't look that much neater than mine, to me, anyway. Especially when you're outputting variables as well, and in real HTML there tend to be attributes:

echo '<table class="someclass">
  <tr class="otherclass" onclick="alert(\'Hello!\');">
    <td onclick='alert("Hello!  How\\\'re you?");'>
      ' . $somevalue . '
    </td>
  </tr>
</table>';

// or...

echo "<table class=\"someclass\">
  <tr class=\"otherclass\" onclick=\"alert('Hello!');\">
    <td onclick='alert(\"Hello!  How\\'re you?\");'>
      $somevalue
    </td>
  </tr>
</table>";

A heredoc block might be appropriate, but they're less efficient than breaking out of PHP parsing mode (actually, so is echo, I think, especially with the double quotes).