Parsing single CSV column delimited by ~HEADER@

Question

I have a CSV file which needs some additional processing. I've got most of our custom functionality completed. My stuck at the moment is the latest addition to the feed, multiple categories in 1 column. Here is a quick example of the new field setup.

Category01@Things~Category01@Will~Category01@Be~Category01@Here~Category02@Testing~Category02@More text here~Category02@Any data~Category02@No more data for this category~LastCategory@This~LastCategory@Is~LastCategory@The~LastCategory@End

I would need to build an array in PHP from each category available, similar to;

$category01 = array('Things', 'Will', 'Be', 'Here');

Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Answer 1

If I understand your question and the format correctly, categories separated by ~, and each listed as "SomeString@Category Name", then this should to the trick. However I don't think this has anything to do with the CSV format.

$pairs = explode('~', $string);
$cats = array();
foreach ($pairs as $pair) {
    list($cat_number, $cat_name) = explode('@', $pair);
    $cats[] = $cat_name;
}

Answer 2

Gahhh. the goggles, they do nothing!

If you're unable to change that output form (and it SHOULD be changed to something nicer), you'll have to go brute force:

$csv = '...';
$categories = array();
$parts = explode('~', $csv);
foreach($parts as $part) {
    $bits = explode('@', $part);
    $category = (int)substr($part[0], 8);
    if (!is_array($categories[$category])) {
        $categories[$category] = array();
    }
    $categories[$category][] = $part[1];
}

Of course, this'll blow up on your LastCategory stuff at the tail end of that "csv". so... let me again STRONGLY urge you fix up whatever's generating that so-called "csv" in the first place.