Question

I did a search, but nothing I saw was the same or could help.

I’ve got rows coming in from a db and what I want to do is divide that into 5 columns.

This is what I have, it only shows 4 columns and well I’m stuck….

$result is the array containing the db rows.

$divider = floor(count($result) / 5);
$roundup = ceil(count($result) / 5);

$start = 0;

for ($i = 0; $i <= $divider; $i++) {
    $splResult = array_slice($result, $start, $roundup);    

    $content .= '<li>';         

    foreach ($splResult as $row) {          
        $content = "content goes here";
    }

    $content .= '</li>';                

    $start = $start + $roundup;
}

So lets say I have 16 items coming in. The result I would like to get is (or at least better distributed):

<ol>
    <li>
        <div>1</div>
        <div>2</div>
        <div>3</div>
    </li>
    <li>
        <div>4</div>
        <div>5</div>
        <div>6</div>
    </li>
    <li>
        <div>7</div>
        <div>8</div>
        <div>9</div>
    </li>
    <li>
        <div>10</div>
        <div>11</div>
        <div>12</div>
    </li>
    <li>
        <div>13</div>
        <div>14</div>
        <div>15</div>
        <div>16</div>
    </li>
</ol>

Note: what comes in from the db could range from 0 to 100 rows. But it must always be divided in 5 columns.

Answer 1

Here’s a solution. No guarantees that it’s the best.

$cnt  = count($result);

// creates an array which evenly distributes numbers across 
// a series of entries.
$nums = array(0,0,0,0,0);
for( $i = 0; $i < $cnt; $i++ ) $nums[ $i % 5 ]++;

echo '<ol>';
$k = 0;
for( $i = 0; $i < 5; $i++ )
{
    echo '<li>';
    // iterate through the count for this column.
    for( $j = 0; $j < $nums[ $i ]; $j++ )
    {
        echo '<div>' . $result[ $k ] . '<div>';
        $k++;
    }
    echo '</li>';
}
echo '</ol>';