Rendering nested array in a <ol> with headings

Question

I have an array with the following structure

Array 
( 
    [0] => Array 
        ( 
            [area] => Area ABC 
            [activity] => Array 
                ( 
                    [0] => Activity 1
                    [1] => Activity 2
                ) 
        ) 
) 

I'm trying to render this array in the following way

Area ABC

1. Activity 1
2. Activity 2

And am currently using the following code to achieve this

$status = 'closed';
foreach($suggestions as $suggestion)
    {
    if($currentarea != $suggestion['area'])
        {
        echo "<h3>";
        echo $suggestion['area'];
        echo "</h3>";
        if($status == 'closed')
            {
            echo "<ol>";
            $status = 'open';
            }
        }
    foreach($suggestion['activity'] as $activity)
        {
            echo "<li>";
            echo $activity;
            echo "</li>";
        }
    if($status == 'open')
        {
            echo "</ol>";
            $status = 'closed';
        }
    $currentarea = $suggestion['area'];
    }

Is this the best way of doing it, or is there a better way, I will have more areas and activities, but the structure stays the same.

Answer 1

This won't work if each suggestion does not start a new area.

foreach($suggestions as $suggestion)
    {
    if($currentarea != $suggestion['area'])
        {
        echo "<h3>";
        echo $suggestion['area'];
        echo "</h3>";
        if($status == 'closed')
            {
            echo "<ol>";
            $status = 'open';
            }
        }
    foreach($suggestion['activity'] as $activity)
        {
            echo "<li>";
            echo $activity;
            echo "</li>";
        }
    if($status == 'open')
            {
            echo "</ol>";
            $status = 'closed';
            }
    $currentarea = $suggestion['area'];
    }

You close on every iteration that it's open and add list items on every iteration, but you only open if the area changes.

foreach($suggestions as $suggestion)
{
    echo '<h3>';
    echo $suggestion['area'];
    echo "</h3>\n";
    echo "<ol>\n";

    foreach($suggestion['activity'] as $activity)
    {
        echo '  <li>';
        echo $activity;
        echo "</li>\n";
    }

    echo "</ol>\n";
}

This code is simpler and will work more reliably.

This is the wrong place to discuss how to write new code. But if you want to get the previous concept working, you'll want to open and close inside the if that checks if the area has changed. Or pull off the first element of the list so that you can treat it differently. Or make a new list where there's only one suggestion per area, combining multiple suggestions with the same area into one.

Answer 2

I'll add to @mdfst13's answer that you should use concatenation when you want to display your strings. I get the idea that you want to separate things, but really, 3 lines to display a list item ?

One article I read gave a good example about that, with the ternary operator. Let's say you have to display some thing, and at a specific location, you could have the singular or plural form of a name (like "one knife" or "x knives"), depending on the value of a variable. Are you gonna really spend 6 lines of code (in the case you don't over-use newlines) just for that (1 for the first part of the sentence, 4 for the if/else, 1 to resume the sentence) ? Is that condition what is important in your code ?

Having a well-spaced code is important, but sometimes concision is also important. You just have to find the right balance.