Sort multi-dimensional array by considering 2 different properties

Question

I have an array for example

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
            [id] => 6
            [name] => ah
            [order] => 4
        )
    [1] => Array
        (
            [id] => 5
            [name] => hz
            [order] => 
        )
    [2] => Array
        (
            [id] => 7
            [name] => ch
            [order] => 
        )

    [3] => Array
        (
            [id] => 5
            [name] => 
            [order] => 
        )

    [4] => Array
        (
            [id] => 4
            [name] => zh
            [order] => 1
        )
)

It needs to be sorted first by "order", if order isn't available, it is sorted in alphabetical order with the "name" (but those arrays goes after all the arrays that have the sort order), and if no "order" and no "name", it goes at the end of the array.

So the above array would need to become:

Array
(
    [0] => Array
        (
            [id] => 4
            [name] => zh
            [order] => 1
        )
    [1] => Array
        (
            [id] => 6
            [name] => ah
            [order] => 4
        )
    [2] => Array
        (
            [id] => 7
            [name] => ch
            [order] => 
        )
    [3] => Array
        (
            [id] => 5
            [name] => hz
            [order] => 
        )
    [4] => Array
        (
            [id] => 5
            [name] => 
            [order] => 
        )

)

I've tried some for looping but nothing close to a solution.

BogdanM · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-11 16:30:34Z

4

Have you looked at array_multisort?

foreach ($data as $key => $row) {
   $name[$key]  = $row['name'];
   $order[$key] = $row['order'];
}

array_multisort($name, SORT_DESC, $order, SORT_ASC, $data);

PHP array multisort

answered Feb 11, 2015 at 16:30

BogdanM

6351 gold badge6 silver badges10 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

3 Comments

Dan P. Over a year ago

Checking array multisort. Ps this code doesn't return the correctly sorted array.

BogdanM Over a year ago

@robertparé the code was simply an example of using array_multisort. By combining loops with sorts your problem should be solved. array_multisort($order, SORT_ASC, $name, SORT_ASC, $data);

Dan P. Over a year ago

Could you give the answer so the resulted array is correct? I have trouble with looping and can't find the solution with array multisort either.

Jason McCreary · Accepted Answer · 2015-02-11 17:07:59Z

1

array_multisort() might not provide enough control to achieve the sorting you require.

As an alternative, you could use uasort() and provide a custom comparison function.

For example:

function compare($a, $b) {
    if (empty($a['order']) && !empty($b['order'])) {
        return 1;
    }

    if (!empty($a['order']) && empty($b['order'])) {
        return -1;
    }

    if ($a['order'] == $b['order']) {
        return strnatcmp($a['name'], $b['name']);
    }

    return ($a['order'] < $b['order']) ? -1 : 1;
}

uasort($arr, 'compare');

answered Feb 11, 2015 at 17:07

Jason McCreary

73.3k23 gold badges140 silver badges177 bronze badges

1 Comment

Dan P. Over a year ago

Working great, thanks. I just added strtolower() to both $a['name'] and $b['name'] else it wasn't sorting properly

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Sort multi-dimensional array by considering 2 different properties

2 Answers 2

3 Comments

1 Comment

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

2 Answers 2

3 Comments

1 Comment

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest