{foreach} is used for looping over arrays of data. {foreach} has a simpler and cleaner syntax than the {section} loop, and can also loop over associative arrays.
{foreach $arrayvar as $itemvar}
{foreach $arrayvar as $keyvar=>$itemvar}
Note
This foreach syntax does not accept any named attributes. This syntax is new to Smarty 3, however the Smarty 2.x syntax {foreach from=$myarray key="mykey" item="myitem"} is still supported.
{foreach}loops can be nested.The
arrayvariable, usually an array of values, determines the number of times{foreach}will loop. You can also pass an integer for arbitrary loops.{foreachelse}is executed when there are no values in thearrayvariable.{foreach}properties are@index,@iteration,@first,@last,@show,@total.Instead of specifying the
keyvariable you can access the current key of the loop item by{$item@key}(see examples below).
Note
The $var@property syntax is new to Smarty 3, however when using the Smarty 2 {foreach from=$myarray key="mykey" item="myitem"} style syntax, the $smarty.foreach.name.property syntax is still supported.
Note
Although you can retrieve the array key with the syntax {foreach $myArray as $myKey => $myValue}, the key is always available as $myValue@key within the foreach loop.
Option Flags:
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| nocache | Disables caching of the {foreach} loop |
Example 82. A simple {foreach} loop
<?php
$arr = array('red', 'green', 'blue');
$smarty->assign('myColors', $arr);
?>
Template to output $myColors in an un-ordered list
<ul>
{foreach $myColors as $color}
<li>{$color}</li>
{/foreach}
</ul>
The above example will output:
<ul>
<li>red</li>
<li>green</li>
<li>blue</li>
</ul>
Example 83. Demonstrates the an additional key variable
<?php
$people = array('fname' => 'John', 'lname' => 'Doe', 'email' => 'j.doe@example.com');
$smarty->assign('myPeople', $people);
?>
Template to output $myArray as key/value pairs.
<ul>
{foreach $myPeople as $value}
<li>{$value@key}: {$value}</li>
{/foreach}
</ul>
The above example will output:
<ul>
<li>fname: John</li>
<li>lname: Doe</li>
<li>email: j.doe@example.com</li>
</ul>
Example 84. {foreach} with nested item and key
Assign an array to Smarty, the key contains the key for each looped value.
<?php
$smarty->assign('contacts', array(
array('phone' => '555-555-1234',
'fax' => '555-555-5678',
'cell' => '555-555-0357'),
array('phone' => '800-555-4444',
'fax' => '800-555-3333',
'cell' => '800-555-2222')
));
?>
The template to output $contact.
{* key always available as a property *}
{foreach $contacts as $contact}
{foreach $contact as $value}
{$value@key}: {$value}
{/foreach}
{/foreach}
{* accessing key the PHP syntax alternate *}
{foreach $contacts as $contact}
{foreach $contact as $key => $value}
{$key}: {$value}
{/foreach}
{/foreach}
Either of the above examples will output:
phone: 555-555-1234 fax: 555-555-5678 cell: 555-555-0357 phone: 800-555-4444 fax: 800-555-3333 cell: 800-555-2222
Example 85. Database example with {foreachelse}
A database (PDO) example of looping over search results. This example is looping over a PHP iterator instead of an array().
<?php
include('Smarty.class.php');
$smarty = new Smarty;
$dsn = 'mysql:host=localhost;dbname=test';
$login = 'test';
$passwd = 'test';
// setting PDO to use buffered queries in mysql is
// important if you plan on using multiple result cursors
// in the template.
$db = new PDO($dsn, $login, $passwd, array(
PDO::MYSQL_ATTR_USE_BUFFERED_QUERY => true));
$res = $db->prepare("select * from users");
$res->execute();
$res->setFetchMode(PDO::FETCH_LAZY);
// assign to smarty
$smarty->assign('res',$res);
$smarty->display('index.tpl');?>
?>
{foreach $res as $r}
{$r.id}
{$r.name}
{foreachelse}
.. no results ..
{/foreach}
The above is assuming the results contain the columns named id and name.
What is the advantage of an iterator vs. looping over a plain old array? With an array, all the results are accumulated into memory before being looped. With an iterator, each result is loaded/released within the loop. This saves processing time and memory, especially for very large result sets.