PHP array search within array

Question

$keywords = array('red', 'blue', 'yellow', 'green', 'orange', 'white');

$strings = array(
'She had a pink dress',
'I have a white chocolate',
'I have a green balloon',
'I have a chocolate shirt',
'He had a new yellow book',
'We have many blue boxes',
'I have a magenta tie');

In reality the strings array is really huge (50k+ entries).

What is the best way of running search and extracting the matching strings only?

If the data comes from a database, you should filter there already. Otherwise you can use array_filter() — jeroen
– jeroen, Commented Dec 27, 2015 at 16:39
@Shafizadeh it's the other way round, need to check if any of the keywords exist in every string. — Bengali
– Bengali, Commented Dec 27, 2015 at 16:43
In each string, you mean? Otherwise your small example already gives no results. — GolezTrol
– GolezTrol, Commented Dec 27, 2015 at 16:50
@GolezTrol if a string contains any of the words from the keywords array then the condition is true. — Bengali
– Bengali, Commented Dec 27, 2015 at 16:52

adeneo · Accepted Answer · 2015-12-27 17:13:27Z

4

Use array_filter to filter the $strings array.
Split the strings into an array, then trim each word, and use array_intersect to check if the array of words contains any of the $keywords.

$result = array_filter($strings, function($val) use ($keywords) {
    return array_intersect( array_map('trim', explode(' ', $val)) , $keywords);
});

edited Dec 27, 2015 at 17:13

answered Dec 27, 2015 at 17:00

adeneo

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2 Comments

flec Over a year ago

I would rather use the use statement in you lambda function instead of the global keyword.

adeneo Over a year ago

@flec - I really don't like use, but as the keywords probably doesn't change, there shouldn't be any issues here, so I agree, and edited.

worldofjr · Accepted Answer · 2016-10-06 00:18:59Z

4

The best way is to use array_filter().

$filtered_array = array_filter($strings,'filter');

function filter($a)
{
    $keywords = array('red', 'blue', 'yellow', 'green', 'orange', 'white');

    foreach ($keywords as $k)
    {
        if (stripos($a,$k) !== FALSE)
        {
            return TRUE;
        }
    }

    return FALSE;
}

edited Oct 6, 2016 at 0:18

answered Dec 27, 2015 at 16:51

worldofjr

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6 Comments

adeneo Over a year ago

Didn't know you could actually pass an array to stripos

worldofjr Over a year ago

If this or any answer has solved your question please consider accepting it by clicking the check-mark. This indicates to the wider community that you've found a solution and gives some reputation to both the answerer and yourself. There is no obligation to do this.

adeneo Over a year ago

And you can't, it throws stripos(): needle is not a string or an integer

worldofjr Over a year ago

@adeneo Avoided this problem with a loop. Not the most elegant solution, but it works.

flec Over a year ago

For performance reasons I would define $keywords outside of your filter function and include it with the use statement.

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