Convert a series of parent-child relationships into a hierarchical tree?

Question

I have a bunch of name-parentname pairs, that I\'d like to turn into as few heirarchical tree structures as possible. So for example, these could be the pairings:

Answer 1

Here's what I came up with:

$arr = array(
            'H' => 'G',
            'F' => 'G',
            'G' => 'D',
            'E' => 'D',
            'A' => 'E',
            'B' => 'C',
            'C' => 'E',
            'D' => null );

    $nested = parentChild($arr);
    print_r($nested);

    function parentChild(&$arr, $parent = false) {
      if( !$parent) { //initial call
         $rootKey = array_search( null, $arr);
         return array($rootKey => parentChild($arr, $rootKey));
      }else { // recursing through
        $keys = array_keys($arr, $parent);
        $piece = array();
        if($keys) { // found children, so handle them
          if( !is_array($keys) ) { // only one child
            $piece = parentChild($arr, $keys);
           }else{ // multiple children
             foreach( $keys as $key ){
               $piece[$key] = parentChild($arr, $key);
             }
           }
        }else {
           return $parent; //return the main tag (no kids)
        }
        return $piece; // return the array built via recursion
      }
    }

outputs:

Array
(
    [D] => Array
        (
            [G] => Array
                (
                    [H] => H
                    [F] => F
                )

            [E] => Array
                (
                    [A] => A
                    [C] => Array
                        (
                            [B] => B
                        )    
                )    
        )    
)