Printing out a nested list of categories from Magento using a recursive function

Question

So I have the following code in /[my-theme-name]/template/catalog/navigation/left.phtml as a proof of concept:

<?php
$Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation = new Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation();
$categories = $Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation->getStoreCategories();

function render_flat_nav($categories) {
    $html = '<ul>';
    foreach($categories as $category) {
        $html .= '<li><a href="' . $category->getCategoryUrl($cat) . '">' . 
                  $category->getName() . "</a>\n";
        if($category->hasChildren()) {
            $children = $category->getChildren();
            $html .= render_flat_nav($children);
        }
        $html .= '</li>';
    }
    return $html . '</ul>';
}
echo render_flat_nav($categories); ?>

It works great for level 0 and level 1 categories but any categories that are more deeply nested are never printed out.

So $category->getChildren() can't quite be returning what I expect it to. Is there a method I can call that will work with my recursive function?

It returns a collection of classes, but I am assume it is different in some way to the collection returned by getStoreCategories() — Treffynnon
– Treffynnon, Commented Aug 26, 2011 at 9:53
Doesn't it return the children of the category? I don't know magento, try to check the document. — xdazz
– xdazz, Commented Aug 26, 2011 at 9:56
Maybe you can just use Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation#renderCategoriesMenuHtml (see docs.magentocommerce.com/Mage_Catalog/…)? Why do you need an extra function for it? — Simon
– Simon, Commented Aug 28, 2011 at 21:17

Treffynnon · Accepted Answer · 2011-08-26 09:52:53Z

1

I have found an answer to the problem, but it could be sub-optimal:

<?php
$Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation = new Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation();
$categories = $Mage_Catalog_Block_Navigation->getStoreCategories();

function render_flat_nav($categories) {
    $html = '<ul>';
    foreach($categories as $category) {
        $html .= '<li><a href="' . $category->getCategoryUrl($cat) . '">' . 
                  $category->getName() . "</a>\n";
        if($category->hasChildren()) {
            $children = Mage::getModel('catalog/category')->getCategories($category->entity_id);
            $html .= render_flat_nav($children);
            }
        $html .= '</li>';
    }
    return $html . '</ul>';
}
echo render_flat_nav($categories); ?>

answered Aug 26, 2011 at 9:52

Treffynnon

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TTech IT Solutions · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-19 15:39:49Z

$_category = Mage::getModel('catalog/category')->load(257);    
         $_categories = $_category
                    ->getCollection()
                    ->addAttributeToSelect(array('name', 'image', 'description'))
                    ->addIdFilter($_category->getChildren());

function render_flat_nav($categories) {
    $html = '<ul>';
    foreach($categories as $category) {
        $html .= '<li><a href="' . $category->getCategoryUrl($cat) . '">' . 
                  $category->getName() . "</a>\n";
        if($category->hasChildren()) {
            $children = Mage::getModel('catalog/category')->getCategories($category->entity_id);
            $html .= render_flat_nav($children);
            }
        $html .= '</li>';
    }
    return $html . '</ul>';
}
echo render_flat_nav($_categories);

Thanks to the above i managed to get this to work for a specific category id and this works with flat categories aswell.

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