PHP Multi-Sort Function - Sorts an array based on positional matches in other arrays.

sort_by_array.php

<?php

/**
 *  Sorts an array based on matching multiple criteria.
 *  Given
 *  $array => ['big cat', 'small dog', 'big dog', 'small cat']
 *  $criteira =>[['dog','cat'], ['big','small']]
 *
 *  Results: (biggest to smallest)
 *  ['big dog', 'small dog', 'big cat', 'small cat']
 *
 * @param array $array      The array to be sorted
 * @param array $criteria   The criteria
 * @param array $defaults   Any default indexes.
 */
function sort_by_array(&$array, $criteria, $defaults=array()){
    $cache = array();

    // prepare the criteria by sorting them from longest to shortest
    // maintaining the original key (index)
    foreach($criteria as &$c){
        uasort($c, function($a,$b){
            return  strlen($b) - strlen($a);
        });
    }

    // define a function for returning the index matching the given str
    // given: 'one' and ['zero', 'one', 'two'] returns 1
    $findIndex = function($str, $values){
        foreach($values as $index=>$value){
            if( stripos($str, $value) !== FALSE ){
                return $index;
            }
        }
        return NULL;
    };

    // define a function to calculate a weighted value based on the criteria
    // returns a value similar to: 2000-0000-3300 (one segment for each criteria)
    $calculateValue = function($str) use ($criteria, $findIndex, $defaults, $cache){
        if( !isset($cache[$str]) ){
            $parts = array();
            foreach($criteria as $i=>$c){
                $parts[$i] = $findIndex($str, $c);
                if( $parts[$i] === NULL ){
                    $parts[$i] = (isset($defaults[$i]) ? $defaults[$i] : 9999);
                }
                $parts[$i] = str_pad($parts[$i], 4, '0');
            }
            $cache[$str] = implode($parts, '-');
        }
        return $cache[$str];
    };

    // define our compare function
    $compare = function($a, $b) use ($calculateValue){
        $av = $calculateValue($a);
        $bv = $calculateValue($b);
        return $av > $bv;
    };

    // sort the array`
    usort($array, $compare);
}


$animals = ['big cat', 'small dog', 'big dog', 'small cat'];
$sort_criteria = [['dog','cat'], ['big','small']];
sort_by_array($animals, $sort_criteria);
print_r($animals);