[Resolved] Anyone familiar with output buffering? I need advice

[Norman_Graham]

I already asked this under GENERAL and got no replies.

I have data (text) in a MySQL table and the text contains some PHP code (for calling external URLs). When I output the table entries to HTML, the PHP doesn't, of course, get interpreted. Thus the links don't work.

The solution might be to use ob_start() and shove the table output into the buffer before outputting to HTML. However, the standard setting for output buffering seems to be 4096. I'm told that this means 4096 bytes. This is a very small buffer (slightly less than one A4 page of text). Do I have to repeat the process several times, only allowing 3-4 table rows to be queried at a time and then using ob_end_clean(), repeating continuously until the table is finished, or is there another way round this buffer limit? Perhaps using ob_get_contents() several times and concatenating the variable?

There must be a solution because even relatively short tables are going to contain more than 4096 bytes of data.

The other solution would be to use eval(), but I like the buffering solution if it will work smoothly.

Any advice and explanations gratefully received.

Thanx

Norman

[xblue]

there may be others who are more experienced with this, but since you've been left without an answer once already, I'll give it a try:

the default value for output buffering is off, which means output buffering is only used if you call output buffering functions in your scripts (no limit of buffer size as I understand it).
other possible values: on = automatical output buffering for all scripts or a number, which limits the buffer size.

anyway, I don't think this is what you need, because php code would still not be evaluated as far as I know. this is what eval() is for.

[Norman_Graham]

... thanks for that. I'd been led to understand that using the buffer would cause any integrated PHP to be interpreted between the MySQL database and the browser output. So I can now forget that and concentrate on making use of eval().

Thanx

Norman