Question

Trying to loop thru a result that has items. Items have a type and trying to echo out the category title for each group. Normally this works excellent with one loop but the $item-type foreach I Think is throwing things off. Any solutions?

<h2>Package <?=$packages->id?></h2>

<?php foreach($packages->item as $item):?>

    <?php foreach($item->type as $type):?>

        <?php $subtype = null;?>

        <?php if($subtype != $type->name)?>

            <h3><?=$type->name?></h3>

            <?=$item->name?><br>

            <?php $subtype = $type->name;?>

    <?php endforeach;?>

<?php endforeach;?>

DB structure:

items
    id   name
    1    mainitem1
    2    mainitem2
    3    item1
    4    item2
    5    item3
    6    item4

types
    id   name
    1    category 1
    2    category 2
    3    subcategory1
    4    subcategory2

item_type
    id   item_id   type_id
    1    1         1
    2    2         2
    3    3         3
    4    4         3
    5    5         4
    6    6         4

packages
    id   item_id
    1    1
    2    2

item_package
    id   package_id   item_id
    1    1            3
    2    1            5
    3    2            4
    4    2            6

What my result currently is:

package 1
    category 1
        item 3
    category 1
        item 5
    category 2
        item 4
    category 2
        item 6

Desired result:

package 1
    category 1
        item 3
        item 5
    category 2
        item 4
        item 6

Answer 1

$subtype has no role to play since it was set to Null before the if statement

$subtype = null;
if($subtype != $type->name)  <------- This would always be true

Category Name is also duplicated since its in the inner loop instead of outer loop

This is all i think you need

printf("<h2>%s</h2>", $packages->id);
foreach ( $packages->item as $item ) {
    printf("<h3>%s</h3>", $type->name);
    print("<ul>");
    foreach ( $item->type as $type ) {
        printf("<li>%s</li>", $item->name);
    }
    print("</ul>");
}