question regarding SPL iterator

Hi
i just found out about iterators. i have made this simple example but how can i show just one element of the object?
in procedural fashion i use echo $row['fname'] for example.
but with the iterator how cat i target just one element?

i attach the iterator test i made:

best regards

ron
$iterator = new LimitIterator($result);
	foreach ($iterator as $row)
	{
		foreach ($row as $field => $value)
		{
			echo "$field: $value<br/>";
		}
		echo '<br/>';
	}

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derridaAsked:
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Beverley PortlockConnect With a Mentor Commented:
I'm not sure you can.

The whole idea of an iterator is to work your way through an entire collection. There is an iterator to array function, but since you are starting with an array that just seems pointless.

http://uk2.php.net/manual/en/function.iterator-to-array.php

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Richard QuadlingSenior Software DeveloperCommented:
Interesting.

Are you going to be "filtering" the output to only contain 1 element from the array.

Or

Are you going to be "limiting" the output to only contain 1 element from the array.

I think both could be used to achieve the results.

http://docs.php.net/manual/en/class.filteriterator.php has a good example on 1 use.

You have to remember that the iterators are base classes. For example the limit iterator does actually do the limiting. You have to extend the limititerator and then add the limiting yourself.

Due to the lack of clear documentation and explanation on the SPL, they are not clearly understood by anyone except the people who created them.

They ARE useful, but sometimes it seems to be so much easier to DIY.

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Beverley PortlockCommented:
I was not aware of the FilterIterator class - you always find something new....

Moving back to the question if only one element is required and it is in an array to start with then I cannot think why you would iterate to get it. If it was in the database it would seem more sensible to retrieve only that value.

"They ARE useful, but sometimes it seems to be so much easier to DIY."

Agreed.
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derridaAuthor Commented:
Hi
thanks for the answers.
so when will it is usefull to use the iterators?  it seem not very flexible, isn`t it?
ron
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Richard QuadlingConnect With a Mentor Senior Software DeveloperCommented:
Oh they are VERY VERY flexible. And that is a problem. The Oxygen documentation isn't too clear to a LOT of people (http://www.php.net/~helly/php/ext/spl/).

The official PHP documentation isn't yet complete and there are not enough real world examples.

I used to use the directory iterators ...

foreach(new RecursiveIteratorIterator(new RecursiveDirectoryIterator($path)) as $o_File) {
...
}

But when checking the actual file i/o for this, I really should have been using the caching variants and even then, doing it myself (recursive scandir()), then I found it much quicker.

Emulating a filter on this was easy enough also.

And you can wrap them all up in nice classes.

I think Helly's work is superb. I can see it is clever, useful, interesting and provides many standards. But I don't see enough examples of how to apply this to my own code.


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