Sort and display directory list alphabetically using opendir() in php

Question

php noob here - I've cobbled together this script to display a list of images from a folder with opendir, but I can't work out how (or where) to sort the array alphabetically

<?php

// opens images folder
if ($handle = opendir('Images')) {
while (false !== ($file = readdir($handle))) {

// strips files extensions  
$crap   = array(".jpg", ".jpeg", ".JPG", ".JPEG", ".png", ".PNG", ".gif", ".GIF", ".bmp", ".BMP", "_", "-");    

$newstring = str_replace($crap, " ", $file );   

//asort($file, SORT_NUMERIC); - doesnt work :(

// hides folders, writes out ul of images and thumbnails from two folders

    if ($file != "." && $file != ".." && $file != "index.php" && $file != "Thumbnails") {
    echo "<li><a href=\"Images/$file\" class=\"thickbox\" rel=\"gallery\" title=\"$newstring\"><img src=\"Images/Thumbnails/$file\" alt=\"$newstring\" width=\"300\"  </a></li>\n";}
}
closedir($handle);
}

?>

Any advice or pointers would be much appreciated!

Answer 1

You need to read your files into an array first before you can sort them. How about this?

<?php
$dirFiles = array();
// opens images folder
if ($handle = opendir('Images')) {
    while (false !== ($file = readdir($handle))) {

        // strips files extensions      
        $crap   = array(".jpg", ".jpeg", ".JPG", ".JPEG", ".png", ".PNG", ".gif", ".GIF", ".bmp", ".BMP", "_", "-");    

        $newstring = str_replace($crap, " ", $file );   

        //asort($file, SORT_NUMERIC); - doesnt work :(

        // hides folders, writes out ul of images and thumbnails from two folders

        if ($file != "." && $file != ".." && $file != "index.php" && $file != "Thumbnails") {
            $dirFiles[] = $file;
        }
    }
    closedir($handle);
}

sort($dirFiles);
foreach($dirFiles as $file)
{
    echo "<li><a href=\"Images/$file\" class=\"thickbox\" rel=\"gallery\" title=\"$newstring\"><img src=\"Images/Thumbnails/$file\" alt=\"$newstring\" width=\"300\"  </a></li>\n";
}

?>

Edit: This isn't related to what you're asking, but you could get a more generic handling of file extensions with the pathinfo() function too. You wouldn't need a hard-coded array of extensions then, you could remove any extension.

Answer 2

Using opendir()

opendir() does not allow the list to be sorted. You'll have to perform the sorting manually. For this, add all the filenames to an array first and sort them with sort():

$path = "/path/to/file";

if ($handle = opendir($path)) {
    $files = array();
    while ($files[] = readdir($dir));
    sort($files);
    closedir($handle);
}

And then list them using foreach:

$blacklist = array('.','..','somedir','somefile.php');

foreach ($files as $file) {
    if (!in_array($file, $blacklist)) {
        echo "<li>$file</a>\n <ul class=\"sub\">";
    }
}

Using scandir()

This is a lot easier with scandir(). It performs the sorting for you by default. The same functionality can be achieved with the following code:

$path = "/path/to/file";
$blacklist = array('somedir','somefile.php');

// get everything except hidden files
$files = preg_grep('/^([^.])/', scandir($path)); 

foreach ($files as $file) {
    if (!in_array($file, $blacklist)) {
        echo "<li>$file</a>\n <ul class=\"sub\">";
    }
}

Using DirectoryIterator (preferred)

$path = "/path/to/file";
$blacklist = array('somedir','somefile.php');

foreach (new DirectoryIterator($path) as $fileInfo) {
    if($fileInfo->isDot()) continue;
    $file =  $path.$fileInfo->getFilename();
    echo "<li>$file</a>\n <ul class=\"sub\">";
}