URL "index.php?x=test.html" style navigation

lordtalixx

Ok,

I'm very new to PHP, and I'm sure this question has come up a lot, but for the life of me I couldn't find exactly what I needed in the forum archives. So here goes.

Particularly within the weblogging community, using PHP to dynamically include content within one main index page has become very popular and a convenient way of developing a personal template-type system.

What I would like to do is create such an index page, in which I could create my basic page design, then use a php script to dynamically insert different html files to create subpages. For instance, from the index page, one would link to "http://website.com/index.html?x=links.html" to reach the links page, which would basically be index.html with the links content dynamically included in it.

Hopefully, this would allow me to have a basic html index page that would remain constant throughout the different parts of my site.

I know this is fundamentally a basic thing to do, but as it has become so common, I figured there must be a basic, accepted way to do it. I'd really appreciate a short little explanation of how it's done, as I'm sure many others would. I've scoured the web for this, but apparently it's considered too simple or irrelevant within the PHP community (lol), as there's not much out there.

If anyone does take the time to answer, please don't assume I already know something...again, I'm a newbie. I'll really appreciate the help. THANKS!!!

~JC

Duey

<?
$link = $_GET['x'];
include "$link";
?>

this is how newbs do it very bad but i think it will suit ya.

lordtalixx

So that will allow me to include another html file anywhere within the index.html page?

lordtalixx

Obviously that script would be placed inside the main index.php file where ever the variable content would be loaded, but if you have to define via the url what is loaded, and the script takes up the space of the variable content, how do you have something displayed for the index.php file itself; in other words, how do I include content that will be viewed upon the initial load of the page?

I'd like to include, say, a weblog on the index page, then replace that text with another html file via this script, but how can I keep the weblog content in the index file if I have to include the script there?

Duey

PHP is the fastest web programming language there is, include is probably the function the takes the least time of them all, as you said you are a newb trust me.