How to extract a distinct value in simple xml in php

SimpleXMLElement Object (
[@attributes] => Array ( 
    [type] => array 
)
[time-entry] => Array (
    [0] SimpleXMLElement Object (
        [date] => 2010-06-17 
        [description] => "MGIN0:internal administration"
        [hours] => 7.5
        [id] => 26334957 
        [person-id] => 4912655 
        [project-id] => 4437844
        [todo-item-id] => SimpleXMLElement Object ( 
            [@attributes] => Array (
                [type] => integer 
                [nil] => true 
            ) 
        ) 
    ) 
    [5] => SimpleXMLElement Object (
        [date] => 2010-06-18 
        [description] => "MGPJ1:WG'07 Outreach, schedule send"
        [hours] => 0.25 
        [id] => 26376694
        [person-id] => 2962280 
        [project-id] => 3652412 
        [todo-item-id] => SimpleXMLElement Object (
            [@attributes] => Array ( 
                [type] => integer 
                [nil] => true 
            ) 
        ) 
    ) 
    [6] => SimpleXMLElement Object ( 
        [date] => 2010-06-18 
        [description] => "TCDM1:WG'07 Outreach, upload list"
        [hours] => 0.25 
        [id] => 26376680 
        [person-id] => 2962280 
        [project-id] => 3652412
        [todo-item-id] => SimpleXMLElement Object ( 
            [@attributes] => Array (
                [type] => integer 
                [nil] => true 
            ) 
        ) 
    )
    [7] => SimpleXMLElement Object (
        [date] => 2010-06-18 
        [description] => "MGPJ1: Class of 2009 Anniversary, q/c, testing "
        [hours] => 0.25 
        [id] => 26371073 
        [person-id] => 2962280
        [project-id] => 3652412 
        [todo-item-id] => SimpleXMLElement Object ( 
            [@attributes] => Array ( 
                [type] => integer 
                [nil] => true 
            ) 
        ) 
    )

I want to extract distict value from given information.Here there is a sample of 4 entries,out of which 3 are of same person and 1 is开发者_运维百科 of single person.So i want to extract the single distinct entry. Pls help.I am new to php and not knowing the syntax properly.

i don't quite see the structure of your simplexml object, but you'll need to count the entries with unique person-id s...

$entries = array();
foreach ($object->{'time-entry'} as $entry) {
    if (!isset($entries[$entry->{'person-id'}])) {
        $entries[$entry->{'person-id'}] = array();
    }
    $entries[$entry->{'person-id'}][] = $entry;
}

$theEntryYouNeed = null;
foreach ($entries as $personId => $entryArray) {
    if (count($entryArray) == 1) {
        $theEntryYouNeed = array_pop($entryArray);
        break;
    }
}