How to sort XML feed using PHP

Question

I am new this parsing xml feeds; so I have a piece of code that I have been working on that extracts the data from the xml file. Now I want be able to sort the array by the publish date pubdate. I have not found any examples that can anyone help me.

I used sort() which puts it in some random order.

$xml_headline_key = "*ARRAY*CATCHUP*PROGRAMMENAME";
$xml_link_key = "*ARRAY*CATCHUP*ITEMURL";
$xml_description_key = "*ARRAY*CATCHUP*SHORTSYNOPSIS";
$xml_publish_key = "*ARRAY*CATCHUP*ORIGINALAIRINGDATE";
$story_array = array();
$counter = 0;
class xml_story{
 var $headline, $description, $link, $pubdate;
}
function contents($parser, $data){
 global $current_tag, $xml_headline_key, $xml_link_key, $xml_description_key, $counter, $story_array, $xml_link_key, $xml_publish_key;
 switch($current_tag){
  case $xml_headline_key:
   $story_array[$counter] = new xml_story();
   $story_array[$counter]->headline = $data;
   break;
  case $xml_link_key:
   $story_array[$counter]->link = $data;
  break;
  case $xml_description_key:
   $story_array[$counter]->description = $data;
   $counter++;
   break;
  case $xml_publish_key:
   $story_array[$counter]->pubdate = $data;
  break;
  }
}

$corrie_counter = 0;
sort($story_array);
$dateformat = "D j M, g:ia";

for($x=0;$x<count($story_array);$x++){
 if($story_array[$x]->headline == "Coronation Street"){
 if($corrie_counter != 4){
 echo "<li><span class=\"bold\">". date($dateformat, strtotime($story_array[$x]->pubdate)) . "</span>\n";
echo "\t<span class=\"text\">" . trunc($story_array[$x]->description,30, " ") . "</span>\n";

echo "\t"; $corrie_counter++; } } }

If you want to save some time, I would highly recommend the magpie rss parser. magpierss.sourceforge.net — Shane
– Shane, Commented Nov 19, 2009 at 12:18

Sergi · Accepted Answer · 2009-11-19 12:03:17Z

2

You can use uasort, and inside sortByPubdate define the way the two pubdates should be compared.

uasort($story_array, 'sortByPubdate');
// Sort function
function sortByPubdate($a, $b) {
    if ($a->pubdate == $b->pubdate) {
        return 0;
    }
    return ($a->pubdate < $b->pubdate) ? -1 : 1;
}

answered Nov 19, 2009 at 12:03

Sergi

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2 Comments

NiseNise Over a year ago

thanks, it didn't work the content is the same as before, actually the sort(); actually sorted more than the uasort. Is there something else I need to add with uasort am I missing something???? Oh yeah I included it just above the for loop.

Sergi Over a year ago

Is possible the $story_array is already sorted by date? Just try to order it by a different field (maybe the headline). Also take a look to the documentation php.net/manual/en/function.uasort.php

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