PHP Array and HTML checkboxes

Question

I have a string saved in a MySQL database, the string is as follows:

item:19.99/item2:24.99

I've managed to split array to this:

Array(
[0] => Array
    (
        [0] => item
        [1] => 19.99
    )

[1] => Array
    (
        [0] => item2
        [1] => 24.99
    ))

I need to loop through the array, displaying all items from a MySQL table called 'categories' (where 'item' is a category) but the tricky bit is making the checkboxes in the array selected followed by a textbox containing the price

I knew this was going to be hard to explain and the only way I can make it simpler to understand is by providing the desired HTML output:

<input type="checkbox" value="item" checked="checked" />Item <input type="text" value="19.99"/>
<input type="checkbox" value="item1" />Item 1 <input type="text"/>
<input type="checkbox" value="item2" checked="checked" />Item 2 <input type="text" value="24.99"/>
<input type="checkbox" value="item3" />Item 3 <input type="text"/>
<input type="checkbox" value="item4" />Item 4 <input type="text"/>

What is the price for item3 and where is it stored? And where are the other items names stored? — hakre
– hakre, Commented Jun 27, 2011 at 22:55
Can we have some of the format/data from your database? The categories stuff? — Steve Robbins
– Steve Robbins, Commented Jun 27, 2011 at 22:55

Francois Deschenes · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-27 23:12:29Z

1

First you should restructure your array of "selected items" so that it's easier to work with. See my example. Then, when you loop through all of your items, simply check if there's a price in the selected array.

Example:

// Updated your array of selected item so that the name is the key and the price the value.
//
// For example:
// 
// Array(
// [item] => 19.99
// [item2] => 24.99
// )
foreach ( $selected_items as $key => $selected_item )
{
  $selected_items[$selected_item[0]] = $selected_item[1];
  unset($selected_items[$key]);
}

// ...

// While looping through all of the items from your SQL query:
while ( $item = mysql_fetch_assoc($result) )
{
  if ( ! empty($selected_items[$item]) )
    echo '<input type="checkbox" value="' . $item['key'] . '" selected="selected" />' . $item['name'] . '<input type="text" value="' . $selected_item[$item['key']] . '" />';
  else
    echo '<input type="checkbox" value="' . $item['key'] . '" />' . $item['name'] . '<input type="text"/>';
}

PS: You might want to add a name attribute to the checkboxes and input fields.

Based on your comment below:

Change your foreach loop to this:

foreach($b as $c)
{
  list($key, $value) = explode(':', $c);
  $d[$key] = $value;
}

edited Jun 27, 2011 at 23:12

answered Jun 27, 2011 at 22:59

Francois Deschenes

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5 Comments

baraboom Over a year ago

Yea, what Francois said (and typed much faster than I could). +1 :)

Lee Price Over a year ago

I know this is amateurish but how can I restructure the array, at the moment I have this: $b = explode("/", $a['cat']); foreach($b as $c){ $d[] = explode(":",$c); } Where $a['cat'] is the string

Francois Deschenes Over a year ago

@Lee Price - My updated answer has a new foreach loop for you to use which will do what the foreach loop in my original answer does (i.e. item_name => price). From there, when you loop through the rest of your items, you can check if it exists in the $d array as in my example.

Lee Price Over a year ago

you legend! I didn't do it exactly as you suggested, I used array_key_exists() instead but i got it working thanks to your restructure of the array, so I'm gonna give you all the credit on this one :) thanks again

Francois Deschenes Over a year ago

@Lee Price - I'm glad I could help. :)

Steve Robbins · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-27 23:06:24Z

1

Without your MySQL organization info, this is the best I can get you:

<?php

    $array = array(array('item', '19.99'),
            array('item1', NULL),
            array('item2',  '24.99'),
            array('item3', NULL),
            array('item4', NULL));

    foreach ($array as $item) {

        echo '<input type="checkbox" value="' . $item[0] . '"' . ($item[1] ? ' checked="checked"' : '') . ' />' . $item[0] . '<input type="text"' . ($item[1] ? ' value="' . $item[1] . '"' : '') . "/><br />\n";
    }

?>

Outputs:

<input type="checkbox" value="item" checked="checked" />item<input type="text" value="19.99"/><br />
<input type="checkbox" value="item1" />item1<input type="text"/><br />
<input type="checkbox" value="item2" checked="checked" />item2<input type="text" value="24.99"/><br />
<input type="checkbox" value="item3" />item3<input type="text"/><br />
<input type="checkbox" value="item4" />item4<input type="text"/><br />

http://codepad.org/fGpGCXwm

Hope you can dissect that and make it work for you.

answered Jun 27, 2011 at 23:06

Steve Robbins

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2 Comments

Lee Price Over a year ago

Thanks for this, but this method is not for me as the items are in a different table to the checked items

Steve Robbins Over a year ago

If you could provide some structure of your database then I could make those changes.

Scotty Waggoner · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-27 23:03:36Z

0

Would something like this work?

<?php
foreach($array as $values){
    echo '<input type="checkbox" value="item" checked="checked" />' . $values[0] . ' <input type="text" value="' . $values[1] . '"/>'
}
?>

I'm not sure how you know if a value is checked or not but once you have that in a variable or as part of the the array just use an if statement to output

checked="checked"

if neccessary.

answered Jun 27, 2011 at 23:03

Scotty Waggoner

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Comments

curtisdf · Accepted Answer · 2011-06-27 23:40:02Z

I'm not sure what kind of backend you're using, but a better way to store data in a database is not to combine multiple types of data in the same field, and to use numeric ID's instead of text-based ID's. You could create a table like:

id       name          price
----------------------------------
1        Item          19.99
2        Item 1        0
3        Item 2        24.99
4        Item 3        0
5        Item 4        0

Note that my example shows "0" where no price has been entered. This is because you'd probably want the price column to be stored as a decimal number (with two decimal places), which would make an empty value would default to "0". That's okay. Your user interface doesn't have to display the "0".

Then when you retrieve the data from the database, you might end up with an array like this:

Array(
    [0] => Array
    (
        [id] => 1
        [name] => Item
        [price] => 19.99
    )
    [1] => Array
        [id] => 2
        [name] => Item 1
        [price] => 0
    )
)
and so on...

So then you could display the values in your .php like the following:

<?php
foreach ($data as $row) {
    explode($row);

    if ($price > 0) {
        $checked = 'checked="checked"';
    } else {
        $checked = '';
        $price = '';
    }

    $pattern = '<input type="checkbox" name="categories[%s]" value="1" %s> '
        . '%s <input type="text" name="prices[%s]" value="%s">';

    echo sprintf($pattern, $id, $checked, $name, $id, $price);
}
?>

Then when retrieving form input, the variables you want are $_POST['categories'] and $_POST['prices'].

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