PHP array multiple sort - by value then by key?

Question

I have an array of string keys with numeric values for use in a list of tags with the number of occurances of each tag, thus:

$arrTags['mango'] = 2;
$arrTags['orange'] = 4;
$arrTags['apple'] = 2;
$arrTags['banana'] = 3;

this is so i can display the tag list in descending occurance order thus:

orange (4)
banana (3)
mango (2)
apple (2)

i can use arsort to reverse sort by the value which is brilliant but i also want any tags that have the same numeric value to be sorted alphabetically, so the final result can be:

orange (4)
banana (3)
apple (2)
mango (2)

is there a way i can do this? i'm guessing that usort may be the way to go but i look at the examples on php.net and my eyes glaze over! many thanks!!!

Answer 1

I haven't tried it, but have you tried sorting the keys ascending first, then sorting the values descending?

It seems that most sorts won't move elements around if they're already the same.

Answer 2

Have a look at examples #3: http://uk.php.net/manual/en/function.array-multisort.php

You'll need to create two arrays to use as indexes; one made up of the original array's keys and the other of the original array's values.

Then use multisort to sort by text values (keys of the original array) and then by the numeric values (values of the original array).

Answer 3

You can just create a function to create an empty array and insert them in order based on comparisons.

Answer 4

You're thinking too complicated:

ksort($arrTags);
arsort($arrTags);

Now your array is sorted like you want it to.

Answer 5

SOLVED

After a little experimenation I discovered that array_multisort does the trick nicely:

$tag = array();
$num = array();

foreach($arrTags as $key => $value){
$tag[] = $key;
$num[] = $value;
}

array_multisort($num, SORT_DESC, $tag, SORT_ASC, $arrTags);

:)