How would I do this?

basil

Let me see if I can explain what I'm trying to do and maybe someone can give me some ideas on how to approach the problem.

I have a simple one-table database for technical tips. The table has columns named id, title, date, member and tiptext.

I made a search page where people can search of rtips based on keywords. The search works fine, and lists all of the matching records. But what I would like to do, is have the search bring up just a list of matching titles that are clickable links, such that when I person clicks on one of the titles for a tip, the corresponding tip text will be displayed by itselef on a page. It is this latter part I am having trouble with. I know there must be a way do to this, but I have not figured it out yet. Any ideas would be appreciated.

Basil

jeremuck

One way to do this is to have a php page that expects a variable passed to it. The variable is actually an id, and with the id you can look up the tip.

Your script searches the database and comes up with a list of matching titles.
The each title is a link with a piece like this on the end:

tiptext.php?id=34</a>

The question mark tells the server and PHP that the following is a variable. In this case, named id and it's value is 34.

When tiptext.php is processing, PHP will create a variable called id with the value 34 so you can use it. This is called a GET variable.

So. Say the database comes up with a relevant tip and it's id is 34. You create the link and append it's id to the end using the question mark, the variable name, and it's value. (maybe you have a function to do this).

The link is to a page called tiptext.php.
tiptext.php looks something like this:

//first check to see you have it.
if(isset($id))
{
  // look up the tip in the database and display it.
}
else
{
  // give some error message. Maybe redirect to the search page?
  header('Location: search.php');
}

I've found that I don't trust PHP to create the variable in it's "own scope" because it depends on server configuration. It's safest to check the HTTP_GET_VAR array. in this case, it would be $HTTP_GET_VAR['id'].
I hope this helps. If you need more information, look around at the GET method.

Other ways involve using the path to store variable information (this makes it "search engine friendly"), using session variables, and using the POST method.
All of these methods involve passing a variable to the next page.

basil

That worked great! I used this code:

echo("<A href=\"techtip_details.php?tipnumber=$j\">".htmlspecialchars(stripslashes($row["title"]))."</A>");

where $j=($i+1) so that when I pass tipnumber to my "tipdetails" page, tipnumber will equal 1,2,3....etc. Then I simply so a query of my data base and select the record where id=$j and viola! It displays only the tip correspnding to the title clicked from the previous page. Thanks!

Now, one other small problem. When I click a link from the list of titles and it takes me to my tipdetail page, I would like to have a return link that takes me back to the previous page WITH the previous list of titles. But so far my attempts to link back just acts as if I'm trying to do a new search (with no criteria selected) and I get an error message that I have not entered any search criteria. Is there a way to put a return link that would act more like the Back button on the browser so that I go back to the search page with my original list of titles displayed?

Thanks again!

Basil

jeremuck

sure... a button with a little javascript attached will do the exact same thing as a back button.

Otherwise, what is it that the search page is recieving that makes it search in the first place?

For example, to search, I'm assuming there is a text box. The user enters the word "mouse" in the text box and hits submit.

The search page must assign "mouse" to a variable in order to search...

You use the same technique you just learned.

<a href="search.php?searchVar=mouse">Back to your search</a>

The question is, how do you know what variable the user was searching in the first place.

When we go from the search page to the the tips page, we are passing one variable called tipID or whatever it is. oh, tipnumber.
We can pass more than one variable!


echo("<A href=\"techtip_details.php?tipnumber=$j&searchVar=$searchvar\">".htmlspecialchars(stripslashes($row["title"]))."</A>");

The & symbol tells php that the next thing is ALSO a variable.

You use the exact same technique.

It's simpler to do a little javascript back button, though.

Also, consider making the tip open a new window. When I search, I always open new windows from search results, so I don't lose the results.

michael

If this tip is relatively short you could use a title tag...

<a href="showip.php?<?=$tips[id];?>" title="this is my help text">Tip:<?=$tips[name];?></a>

This could work better for small tips... or a tip preview...
This is good for at least 140 characters.

I believe the logical limit is 255 but you don't want to do this much because it doesn't autowrap, and the contents will go off the screen on machines that don't have a high enough resoultion -- thus making your page seem unprofessional.

Hope this helps.

Michael