Question

I’m having trouble accessing variable from an object. The object is coming from an API feed and a var_dump looks like this:

object(stdClass)#2 (1) {
  ["GetBookingsResult"]=>
  string(189227) "<Bookings>
  <Data>
    <BookingDate>2012-01-06T00:00:00-06:00</BookingDate>
    <StartBookingDate>2012-01-06T00:00:00-06:00</StartBookingDate>
    <RoomDescription>Dorm A</RoomDescription>
    <TimeEventStart>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</TimeEventStart>
    <TimeEventEnd>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</TimeEventEnd>
    <GroupName>Family Retreat</GroupName>
    <EventName>Family Retreat</EventName>
    <SetupTypeDescription>(none)</SetupTypeDescription>
    <SetupCount>27</SetupCount>
    <ReservationID>1222</ReservationID>
    <EventCoordinator />
    <GroupID>12</GroupID>
    <VIP xml:space="preserve"> </VIP>
    <VIPEvent>false</VIPEvent>
    <ClosedAllDay>false</ClosedAllDay>
    <OpenTime>1900-01-01T00:00:00-06:00</OpenTime>
    <CloseTime>1900-01-01T00:00:00-06:00</CloseTime>
    <GroupTypeDescription>Religious - Conference</GroupTypeDescription>
    <EventTypeDescription>Retreat</EventTypeDescription>
    <Contact>Phyllis 0000000000</Contact>
    <AltContact />
    <BookingID>29512</BookingID>
    <TimeBookingStart>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</TimeBookingStart>
    <TimeBookingEnd>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</TimeBookingEnd>
    <GMTStartTime>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</GMTStartTime>
    <GMTEndTime>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</GMTEndTime>
    <BuildingCode>Asb</BuildingCode>
    <Building>Dormitory</Building>
    <RoomCode>ASB A</RoomCode>
    <Room>Dorm A</Room>
    <RoomID>181</RoomID>
    <BuildingID>20</BuildingID>
    <StatusID>1</StatusID>
    <StatusTypeID>-14</StatusTypeID>
    <EventTypeID>1</EventTypeID>
    <GroupTypeID>1</GroupTypeID>
    <DateAdded>2011-01-09T08:25:02.72-06:00</DateAdded>
    <AddedBy>B Jordan</AddedBy>
    <DateChanged>2012-01-08T08:34:23.2-06:00</DateChanged>
    <ChangedBy>J Smith</ChangedBy>
  </Data>

  <Data>
    <BookingDate>2012-01-06T00:00:00-06:00</BookingDate>
    <StartBookingDate>2012-01-06T00:00:00-06:00</StartBookingDate>
    <RoomDescription>Dorm A1</RoomDescription>
    <TimeEventStart>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</TimeEventStart>
    <TimeEventEnd>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</TimeEventEnd>
    <GroupName>Family Retreat</GroupName>
    <EventName>Family Retreat</EventName>
    <SetupTypeDescription>(none)</SetupTypeDescription>
    <SetupCount>27</SetupCount>
    <ReservationID>1222</ReservationID>
    <EventCoordinator />
    <GroupID>12</GroupID>
    <VIP xml:space="preserve"> </VIP>
    <VIPEvent>false</VIPEvent>
    <ClosedAllDay>false</ClosedAllDay>
    <OpenTime>1900-01-01T00:00:00-06:00</OpenTime>
    <CloseTime>1900-01-01T00:00:00-06:00</CloseTime>
    <GroupTypeDescription>Religious - Conference</GroupTypeDescription>
    <EventTypeDescription>Retreat</EventTypeDescription>
    <Contact>Phyllis 0000000000</Contact>
    <AltContact />
    <BookingID>29512</BookingID>
    <TimeBookingStart>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</TimeBookingStart>
    <TimeBookingEnd>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</TimeBookingEnd>
    <GMTStartTime>2012-01-06T15:00:00-06:00</GMTStartTime>
    <GMTEndTime>2012-01-07T00:00:00-06:00</GMTEndTime>
    <BuildingCode>Asb</BuildingCode>
    <Building>Dormitory</Building>
    <RoomCode>Asb A1</RoomCode>
    <Room>Dorm A1</Room>
    <RoomID>7</RoomID>
    <BuildingID>20</BuildingID>
    <StatusID>1</StatusID>
    <StatusTypeID>-14</StatusTypeID>
    <EventTypeID>1</EventTypeID>
    <GroupTypeID>1</GroupTypeID>
    <DateAdded>2011-01-09T08:25:02.72-06:00</DateAdded>
    <AddedBy>P Jordan</AddedBy>
    <DateChanged>2012-01-08T08:34:23.2-06:00</DateChanged>
    <ChangedBy>J Smith</ChangedBy>
  </Data>
</Bookings>"
}

I want to be able to reorder the info that comes back into an array so that I can group the events by date and then order them by EventName. Below is my code:

$xml = simplexml_load_string($result->GetBookingsResult);

$list='';
    foreach($xml as $event){
        $st_date = lvmDateFormat($event->TimeBookingStart,'name');//function reformats date
        $en_date = lvmDateFormat($event->TimeBookingEnd,'name');
        $name =  lvmDateFormat($event->TimeBookingStart,'cal');
        $ename = $event->EventName;
$events[lvmDateFormat($event->TimeBookingStart,'name')][$st_date] = array(
            'EventName' => $ename
            ,'Date' => $name
            ,'TimeEventStart' => $st_date
            ,'TimeEventEnd' => $en_date
        );
    }

If I echo out $event->EventName; it looks fine, but when I try to add it to an array it comes back like this:

 [EventName] => SimpleXMLElement Object
                (
                    [0] => UMW Training Event
                )

What am I doing wrong here?

Ta

Answer 1

When you echo an object, it is converted to a string. So it will appear (because SimpleXMLElement defines a __toString() method internally) like you want it to – but the type of the $event variable is still an object of type SimpleXMLElement.

You can easily store it as a string in the array, if you cast it to a string. Try changing this line:

$ename = $event->EventName;

…to this:

$ename = (string) $event->EventName;