Question

I am looking for a way to count the number of items (in PHP) returned in these JSON strings I am getting when searching a database.

Forgive me because I’m utterly crap at all of this.

I was told because there is no count returned in the JSON version, like there is in the XML one from this database, I would have to use a loop to count the number of results?

I’ve had a look around but nothing seems to fit what I want to do…

The following is an example of the strings I get:

Array ( 
  [0] => stdClass Object ( 
    [score] => 12
    [popularity] => 3
    [name] => Samantha Dark
    [id] => 151019
    [biography] => [url] => http://www.themoviedb.org/person/151019
    [profile] => Array ( )
    [version] => 16
    [last_modified_at] => 2011-04-11 17:17:33
  )

  [1] => stdClass Object (
    [score] => 11
    [popularity] => 3
    [name] => Johnny Dark
    [id] => 158737
    [biography] => [url] => http://www.themoviedb.org/person/158737
    [profile] => Array ( )
    [version] => 14
    [last_modified_at] => 2011-04-11 17:18:38
  )
)

and if applicable, here’s the php I use to request & decipher it

$name = $_GET['search'];
$persons_result = $tmdb->searchPerson($name);
$persons = json_decode($persons_result);

foreach ($persons as $person) {
  echo '<a href="tmdb_person.php?id='.$person->id.'">'.$person->name.'</a></br>';
}

Answer 1

Use the count function on $persons to get the number of items.