quering MySql with PHP

Anon

I have PHP installed on Windows 2000 with IIS 5.0. I have MySQL installed as well. I have a php page with 1 input text box and a submit button. I would like to query the MySQL database to pull the records with that data specified by the user. I would like the output sorted by "date". I get undefined variable and it does nothing. Here is my code: for the search page

<head>
<title>Scrip Search</title>
</head>

<body>
<h1>Scrip Search</h1>

<form action="results.php" method="post">
Enter Family Number:<br>
<input name="fnum" type=text>
<br>
<input type=submit value="Search">
</form>

</body>

here is my code for the output page.

<head>
<title>Scrip Search Results</title>
</head>
<body>
<h1>Scrip Search Results</h1>
<?
if (!$fnum)
{
echo "You have not entered search details. Please go back and try again.";
exit;
}

$fnum = addslashes($fnum);

@ $db = mysql_pconnect("xxxx", "xxxx", "xxxxx");

if (!$db)
{
echo "Error: Could not connect to database. Please try again later.";
exit;
}

mysql_select_db("scrip");
$query = "select * from books where '%".$fnum."%'";
$result = mysql_query($query);

$num_results = mysql_num_rows($result);

echo "<p>Number of records found: ".$num_results."</p>";

for ($i=0; $i <$num_results; $i++)
{
$row = mysql_fetch_array($result);
echo "<p><strong>".($i+1).". Date: ";
echo stripslashes($row["date"]);
echo "</strong><br>Amount: ";
echo stripslashes($row["amount"]);
echo "</p>";
}

</body>

CAN ANYONE HELP? Thank in advance !!

theslinky

If you access your form data using just the field name: $fnum, you need to ensure register_globals is On in php.ini (under C:\WINNT\php.ini).

Otherwise, use the proper (and safe) way:

$_POST['fnum']

also, to check whether a variable is set, use this:

if(!isset($_POST['fnum'])) {
print "you did not enter any data";
}

this will pervent the urgly PHP warning from showing on your page.

-sridhar

Anon

thanks for responding. The error message that is appearing is:

Scrip Search Results

Warning: mysql_num_rows(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL result resource in x:\xxx\xxxx\xx\results.php on line 28

Number of records found:

what lines do i insert the code you told me to use?

theslinky

Tim, if you're getting an error for mysql_num_rows, then that's not a problem with the fnum variable.

Check to see if $result returns false or not and try to print out the mysql error (if there is one).

Also, try replacing $fnum with $_POST['fnum'] in your program.

-sridhar

jesus_hairdo

The error of "supplied argument is not a valid mysql resource" suggests to me that the $result is failing because of an SQL error in your query.

to find the error try changing the line:

$result = mysql_query($query);

to:

$result = mysql_query($query) or die(mysql_error());

this will output any SQL errors, from the select query.