parsing json array in PHP

Question

I have been trying to parse a json array with no success. I can get a root element but not any array elements. Below is the beginning of my json array from Foursquare which has re-occurring venue elements.

 response: {
 keywords: {}
 suggestedRadius: 10000
 headerLocation: "here"
 headerFullLocation: "here"
 headerLocationGranularity: "unknown"
 headerMessage: "Suggestions for Friday evening"
 totalResults: 214
 groups: [
 {
 type: "Recommended Places"
 name: "recommended"
 items: [
 {
 reasons: {
 count: 0
 items: [ ]
 }
 venue: {
 id: "4b799a05f964a520b1042fe3"
 name: "Green Gables"
 contact: {
 phone: "3097472496"
 formattedPhone: "[phone]"
 }
 location: {
 address: "17485 East 2500 North Rd"

Below is my PHP code to try to get the name of the restaurants.

 $obj = json_decode($uri, true);
 foreach($obj['response']['groups'] as $p)
 {
 if(isset($p['items']))
 {
 foreach($p['items'] as $p1)
 {
 if(isset($p1['venue']))
 {
// echo varDumpToString($p1['venue']); // this dump works ok and shows the elements
 foreach($p1['venue'] as $p2)
 {
 echo varDumpToString($p2['name']); // This is where I get the error
 }
 }
 }
 } 
 }

The program drills down to the name element and then gives me an error saying "Unefined index: name" and also 'Illegal string offset name". This message appears 14 times which is one time for each item in the array. So why is "name" not recognized?

• Adrian: When you decoded your json using json_decode(), did you return it as an array or object? If object, try using $p2->name.
• thaJeztah: Are you sure that node is converted to an array, not a stdObject? In that case you can access the name via $p2->name
• thaJeztah: LOL @AdrianCrepaz beat me to it

Answer 1

response.groups[x].items[y].venue is not an array. You are currently trying to access response.groups[x].items[y].venue[z].name, but you are actually accessing response.groups[x].items[y].venue.id.name, which does not exist. That last foreach iterates over the venue properties, not the venues. There is only one venue for each item.

This is what it should look like:

$obj = json_decode($uri, true);
foreach ($obj['response']['groups'] as $group) {
 if (isset($group['items'])) {
 foreach ($group['items'] as $item) {
 if (isset($item['venue'])) {
 echo varDumpToString($item['venue']['name']);
 }
 }
 }
}

• Dave: So what should my last foreach look like? I tried about every combination I can think of. Why am I accessing venue.id.name. I thought id and name were separate elements. I just want to get id and name as separate items.
• jwueller: @Dave - Check out my example. There is only a single venue for each item, so you cannot iterate them. You should also try to use more descriptive names for your variables to improve readability. This makes it a lot easier to catch errors like this.
• Dave: If I do 'echo varDumpToString($p2['venu']['name'] I will get the name but it repeats itself 14 times for each venue. How can I just get the name as a singleton?
• jwueller: @Dave - I am not sure what exactly you are doing, but I suspect the following: If all items have the same venue, the name is obviously displayed multiple times.
• Dave: @elusive - Thanks very much for your suggestion. It worked great! I am a newbie to PHP and it was impossible to find an example of what I was trying to do. Now I know and I really appreciate your help.

Answer 2

Try changing this line,

 foreach($p1['venue'] as $p2)

to

 foreach($p1['venue'] as $p2Key => $p2)

• jwueller: This is not going to help. $p2 will contain 4b799a05f964a520b1042fe3 in the first case, so accessing the name property of that string does not make a lot of sense. This is exactly why OPs code does not work.