UPDATE: I’ve reworked the question, to show progress I’ve made, and maybe make it

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Asked: May 26, 20262026-05-26T14:57:06+00:00 2026-05-26T14:57:06+00:00

UPDATE: I’ve reworked the question, to show progress I’ve made, and maybe make it

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UPDATE: I’ve reworked the question, to show progress I’ve made, and maybe make it easier to answer.

UPDATE 2: I’ve added another value to the XML. Extension available in each zip. Each item can have multiple items separated by a tab. So it will be structured like this. Platform > Extension (Sub Group) > Name > Title. If the item has more than one extension then it will appear in multiple places.

I have the following XML file.

<Item>
    <Platform>Windows</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 1</Name>
    <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/1/1.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Windows</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 1</Name>
    <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/1/2.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Windows</Platform>
    <Ext>gif</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 1</Name>
    <Title>This is in the same group but has a different title</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/1/3.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Mac</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 1</Name>
    <Title>This has the same group name but a different platform. Because it has the same title and name the files are added to this array below.</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/mac/1/1.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Mac</Platform>
    <Ext>jpeg   doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 1</Name>
    <Title>This has the same group name but a different platform. Because it has the same title and name the files are added to this array below.</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/mac/1/2.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Windows</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 2</Name>
    <Title>This is the second file group</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/2/1.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Windows</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 2</Name>
    <Title>This is the second file group</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/2/2.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>
<Item>
    <Platform>Mac</Platform>
    <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
    <Name>File Group 3</Name>
    <Title>This is the second mac file group really.</Title>
    <DownloadPath>/this/windows/3/1.zip</DownloadPath>
</Item>

I want to be able to go through it and sort it so I can insert it into a normalized table schema. Here is the format I would like the array to built.

[Windows] => Array (
    [0] => array(
        "Name" => "File Group 1",
        "Title" => "This is the first file group",
        "Files" => array(
            [0] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/windows/1/1.zip"
            ),
            [1] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/windows/1/2.zip"
            )
        )
    ),
    [1] => array(
        "Name" => "File Group 1",
        "Title" => "This has the same name but has a different title, so it should be seperate.",
        "Files" => array(
            [0] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/windows/1/3.zip"
            )
        )
    ),
    [1] => array(
        "Name" => "File Group 2",
        "Title" => "This is the second file group",
        "Files" => array(
            [0] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/windows/2/1.zip"
            ),
            [1] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/windows/2/2.zip"
            )
        )
    )
),
[Mac] => Array(
    [0] => array(
        "Name" => "File Group 1",
        "Title" => "This has the same group name but a different platform. Because it has the same title and name the files are added to this array below.",
        "Files" => array(
            [0] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/mac/1/1.zip"
            ),
            [1] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/mac/1/2.zip"
            )
        )
    ),
    [1] => array(
        "Name" => "File Group 3",
        "Title" => "This is the second mac file group really.",
        "Files" => array(
            [0] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/mac/1/1.zip"
            ),
            [1] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => "/this/mac/1/2.zip"
            )
        )
    ),
)

Here is what I’ve got so far with my php

    $scrape_xml = "files.xml";
    $xml = simplexml_load_file($scrape_xml);

$groups = array();

foreach ($xml->Item as $file){

            if (!isset($groups[stripslashes($file->Platform)][stripslashes($file->Name)][stripslashes($file->Title)])){

                $groups[stripslashes($file->Platform)][stripslashes($file->Name)][stripslashes($file->Title)] = array(
                    'Platform' => $file->Platform,
                    'Name' => $file->Name,
                    'Title' => $file->Title
                );

            }

   $groups[stripslashes($file->Platform)][stripslashes($file->Name)][stripslashes($file->Title)]['Files'][] = $file->DownloadPath;

}

echo "count=" . $i;

echo "<pre>";
print_r($groups);
echo "</pre>";

it gives me this result

UPDATE 2: New Array Structure

UPDATE 3: There is some garbage coming through for the file list.

<Item>
        <Platform>Windows</Platform>
        <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
        <Name>File Group 1</Name>
        <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
        <DownloadPath>/this/windows/1/1.zip</DownloadPath>
    </Item>
    <Item>
        <Platform>Windows</Platform>
        <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
        <Name>File Group 1</Name>
        <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
        <DownloadPath>/this/windows/1/2.zip</DownloadPath>
    </Item>
<Item>
        <Platform>Windows</Platform>
        <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
        <Name>File Group 1</Name>
        <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
        <DownloadPath>/this/windows/2/1.zip</DownloadPath>
    </Item>
    <Item>
        <Platform>Windows</Platform>
        <Ext>gif    jpeg    doc</Ext>
        <Name>File Group 1</Name>
        <Title>This is the first file group</Title>
        <DownloadPath>/this/windows/2/2.zip</DownloadPath>
    </Item>

There is a item with the same platform, extensions, name and title. Items 3 and 4 above need to be skipped over and save them to an array that I will handle later.

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1 Answer

Editorial Team · Answer 1 · 2026-05-26T14:57:07+00:00

You are merely mapping the input values into the output array by arranging them differently, this is your structure:

Array(
  [... Item/Platform] => Array (
    [... Item/Title as 0-n] => array(
        "Name" => Item/Name,
        "Title" => Item/Title,
        "Files" => array(
            [...] => array(
                "DownloadPath" => Item/DownloadPath
            ),
        )
    ),

The mapping can be done by iterating over the items within the XML and storing the values into the appropriate place in the new array (I named it $build):

$build = array();
foreach($items as $item)
{
    $platform = (string) $item->Platform;
    $title = (string) $item->Title;
    isset($build[$platform][$title]) ?: $build[$platform][$title] = array(
        'Name' => (string) $item->Name,
        'Title' => $title
    );
    $build[$platform][$title]['Files'][] = array('DownloadPath' => (string) $item->DownloadPath);
}
$build = array_map('array_values', $build);

The array_map call is done at the end to convert the Item/Title keys into numerical ones.

And that’s it, here the Demo.

Let me know if that’s helpful.

Edit: For your updated data, it’s a slight modification of the above, the key principles of the previous example still exist, it’s additionally taken care of the extra duplication per each additional extension per item, by adding another iteration inside:

$build = array();
foreach($items as $item)
{
    $platform = (string) $item->Platform;
    $title = (string) $item->Title;
    foreach(preg_split("~\s+~", $item->Ext) as $ext)
    {
        isset($build[$platform][$ext][$title])
            ?:$build[$platform][$ext][$title] = array(
                'Name' => (string) $item->Name,
                'Title' => $title
            );
        $build[$platform][$ext][$title]['Files'][]
            = array('DownloadPath' => (string) $item->DownloadPath);
    }
}
$build = array_map(function($v) {return array_map('array_values', $v);}, $build);

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UPDATE: I’ve reworked the question, to show progress I’ve made, and maybe make it

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