php create navigation menu from multidimensional array dynamically

Question

I did research on this, and wasn\'t able to find an exact answer. Most of the questions/answers on here pertaining to this seem to be unfinished. If anyone knows of a fini

Answer 1

I would probably slightly adapt the array to be something like the following:

Array(
    0 => Array(
        'title' => 'Home',
        'children' => Array()
    ),
    1 => Array(
        'title' => 'Parent',
        'children' => Array(
            0 => Array(
                'title' => 'Sub 1',
                'children' => Array(),
            ),
            1 => Array(
                'title' => 'Sub 2',
                'children' => Array(
                    0 => Array(
                        'title' => 'Sub sub 2-1',
                        'children' => Array(),
                    ),
                ),
            ),
        )
    )
) 

With a structure like this you could use recursion to build your menu HTML:

function buildMenu($menuArray)
{
    foreach ($menuArray as $node)
    {
        echo "<li><a href='#'/>" . $node['title'] . "</a>";
        if ( ! empty($node['children'])) {
            echo "<ul>";
            buildMenu($node['children']);
            echo "</ul>";
        }
        echo "</li>";
    }
}

Answer 2

Calvin's solution worked for me. Here's the edited version. We can use more nested loops to get sub - sub menu items.

echo '<ul>';
foreach ($menu as $parent) {

    echo '<li><a href="#">' . $parent . '</a>';

    if (is_array($parent)) {
        echo '<ul>';
            foreach ($parent as $children) {
                echo '<li><a href="#">' . $children . '</a>';
            }
        echo '</ul>';
    }

    echo '</li>';
}
echo '</ul>';

Answer 3

I think you can use recursion? Here is some pseudocode, not very familiar with php.

function toNavMenu(array A){
    for each element in A{
        echo "<li><a href=\"\">" + element.name + "</a>"
        if (element is an array){
            echo "<ul>"
            toNavMenu(element)
            echo "</ul>"
        }
        echo "</li>"
    }
}

Answer 4

Here is my solution:

<?php

function MakeMenu($items, $level = 0) {
    $ret = "";
    $indent = str_repeat(" ", $level * 2);
    $ret .= sprintf("%s<ul>\n", $indent);
    $indent = str_repeat(" ", ++$level * 2);
    foreach ($items as $item => $subitems) {
        if (!is_numeric($item)) {
            $ret .= sprintf("%s<li><a href=''>%s</a>", $indent, $item);
        }
        if (is_array($subitems)) {
            $ret .= "\n";
            $ret .= MakeMenu($subitems, $level + 1);
            $ret .= $indent;
        } else if (strcmp($item, $subitems)){
            $ret .= sprintf("%s<li><a href=''>%s</a>", $indent, $subitems);
        }
        $ret .= sprintf("</li>\n", $indent);
    }
    $indent = str_repeat(" ", --$level * 2);
    $ret .= sprintf("%s</ul>\n", $indent);
    return($ret);
}

$menu = Array(
            'home' => Array("sub-home1", "sub-home2"),
            'about' => Array("sub-about", "about2" => Array("sub-sub-about")),
            'staff' => Array("sub-staff1", "sub-staff2"),
            'contact' => "contact"
        );

print_r($menu);

echo MakeMenu($menu);

?>