Question

I have a website that contains a manual with many office precedents. When a user uses the HTML upload script it uploads the precedent to a folder on the server. I use the following script to list out all the files in that specific folder.

<?php  //define the path as relative
  $dir = "./OFFICE PRECEDENTS/Business & Corporate Law"; 
  $webpath ="";  //using the opendir function  
  echo "<ol>";    
  // Open a known directory, and proceed to read its contents   
  if ($dh = opendir($dir)) {     
  while (($file = readdir($dh)) !== false) {   
  if (is_dir($dir.'/'.$file)){}      
  else if ($file == '.'){}      
  else if ($file == '..'){} 
  else if ($file == 'index.php'){}     
  else {      
  echo "<li><a href='https://manual.malicki-law.ca/$dir/$file'>$file</a></li>\n";      
  }    
  }       
  closedir($dh);     
  } 
  echo "</ol>";     
  ?>

How can I implement a system to alphabetically sort the list?

Answer 1

For your specific case: If you use scandir() instead of readdir(), the default order is already in alphabetical order.

http://php.net/manual/en/function.scandir.php

The second parameter is:

sorting_order
By default, the sorted order is alphabetical in
ascending order. If the optional sorting_order is set to
SCANDIR_SORT_DESCENDING, then the sort order is alphabetical in
descending order. If it is set to SCANDIR_SORT_NONE then the result is
unsorted.

So instead of:

 if ($dh = opendir($dir)) {     
   while (($file = readdir($dh)) !== false) {   
       // your code   
    }    
  }       
  closedir($dh);  

Just use something like:

if ($files = scandir($dir))
{
    foreach ($files as $file) {
       // your code
    }
}