How many files in a Dir??

[Anon]

I need an algorithm to read how many files are in a folder and based on that randomly select each one for display. I don't want to display any of the files more than once. Anyone?

Marcel.

[Anon]

Well, I am a little confused about what you are after, but to count and randomly select a file from a dir you could use:
$dir = dir("/pathtodir/");
while($file = $dir->read()) {
if (($file != ".") && ($file != "..")) {
$files[] = $file;

	}

}

$dir->close();

srand((double)microtime()*1000000);

$randval = rand (0,(count($files)-1));
printf('<a href="%s">click for file', $files[$randval]);

[Anon]

OK Louie this is what I'm after. Several users have submitted a pic and description for display. I want to get a count of these files and display 5 pics per page in a random order and not display the same pic twice. I think you have me going down the right road...anything to add let me know. Thanks for your help, again!

Marcel

[Anon]

I came with this, maybe it will help I tested it a bunch and it never seemed to put in any duplicates:

$filearray = array();

$dir = dir(".");
while($file = $dir->read()) {
if (($file != ".") && ($file != "..") && (!is_dir($file))) {
$files[] = $file;
}
}
$dir->close();

function add_to_array($element) {
global $filearray;
$filearray[] = $element;
}

function check_array($check) {
global $filearray;
if(!in_array($check, $filearray)) {
return true;
}
else {
return false;
}
}

function get_rand($rand = "") {
global $files;
srand((double)microtime()*1000000);
$randval = rand (0,(count($files)-1));
return $randval;
}

while (count($filearray) < 5) {
$rand = get_rand();
if (check_array($files[$rand])) {
$filearray[] = $files[$rand];
}
}

while (list($key,$val) = each($filearray)) {
print $val."<br>";
}

[Anon]

Very cool! Will give it a go. Thanks a lot Louie.

Marcel.