For a while now I have been using a bit of code for reading the contents of a directory, pushing the found items into an array, then looping over the array with a foreach to create markup for a slideshow, header images, backgrounds, etc. A current project I am working on needs this same functionality but with a twist. I still need to loop over the directory but I need to group the contents into groups or chunks. Enter, PHP’s array_chunk(). This does exactly what I need, but to get the array’s contents neatly on screen I am nesting a set of foreach loops. One for the first subarray, then the other for that subarray’s contents. It goes something like this:

// Initialize the array to hold images
$thelist = array();
// Open directory and add files into array
if ($handle = opendir($dir_path)) {
   // Loop over the directory.
   while (false !== ($file = readdir($handle))) { 
	// Don't include the "."  and 
        // ".." files. As well as the 
        // DS_Store files left by the Mac OS
	if ( $file != "." && $file != ".." && $file != ".DS_Store" ) {
	    array_push($thelist,$file);
	}
   }
   closedir($handle);
}

natsort($thelist); // Put the array in alphabetical order
//shuffle($thelist); // Put the array in random order

// Split array into chunks
$subarray = (array_chunk($thelist, 5));

// Layout the contents
echo "<ul>\n";

foreach ($subarray as $arraygroup) {

	echo "<li>";
	
	foreach ($arraygroup as $arrayitem) {
             // Do pretty markup here
             echo "<p>Item: $arrayitem</p>";
        } // END nest
	
        echo "</li>";
	
} // END main

echo "</ul>\n";

Published on August 31, 2011