Extract categories from Magento by a stand alone php script

Create a file MageRoot/shell/getCategories.php, and here is the code for this php script.
[code language=”php”]
<?php

require_once ‘abstract.php’;

class Mage_Shell_Test extends Mage_Shell_Abstract
{
public function run()
{
$this->getSubCategories(3);
$this->getCatalogCategories();
}

// Get all categories up to 4 levels deep
public function getCatalogCategories()
{
$categories = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->getCollection()
->addAttributeToSelect(‘*’)
->addAttributeToFilter(‘level’, 1)
->addAttributeToFilter(‘is_active’, 1);

//echo "number of categories: ". count($categories);
foreach($categories as $cate)
{
echo $cate->getName()."\n";

$categoryIDs1=explode(‘,’,$cate->getChildren());
//echo implode(",",$categoryIDs1);
foreach($categoryIDs1 as $catId1)
{
$category1 = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($catId1);
$name = $category1->getName();
if(strlen($name)>0)
echo "***,".$category1->getName()."\n";

$categoryIDs2 = explode( ‘,’ , $category1->getChildren() );
foreach($categoryIDs2 as $catId2)
{
$category2 = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($catId2);
$name = $category2->getName();
if(strlen($name)>0)
echo "***,***,".$category2->getName()."\n";

$categoryIDs3 = explode( ",", $category2->getChildren());
foreach($categoryIDs3 as $catId3)
{
$category3 = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($catId3);
$name = $category3->getName();
if(strlen($name)>0)
echo "***,***,***,".$category3->getName()."\n";

$categoryIDs4 = explode(",",$category3->getChildren());
foreach($categoryIDs4 as $catId4)
{

$category4 = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($catId4);

$name = $category4->getName();
if(strlen($name)>0)
echo "***,***,***,***,".$category4->getName()."\n";
}
}
}
}
}
}

// print the category name and it’s parent id as well as all the subcategories if they the category has them
public function getSubCategories($cateId)
{
$category = Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($cateId);
echo "NAME>>>".$category->getName()."PARENT ID>>>".$category->getParentId();
$categories=explode(‘,’,$category->getChildren());
foreach($categories as $cat){
$category=Mage::getModel(‘catalog/category’)->load($cat);
echo $category->getName()."\n";
}
}
}
$shell = new Mage_Shell_Test();
$shell->run();
[/code]

To run the script
[code language=”shell”]
php getCategories.php
[/code]

To run the script and output the result in a csv file
[code language=”php”]
php getCategories.php > categories.csv
[/code]