question about display rows in altenating <td> colors

[dv6cougar]

$counter = 0;
	while($row = mysql_fetch_array($homeql)){
	$counter++;
if ($counter > 1) {
       echo "</td></tr><tr>";
       echo "<td class=2nd>";
}
if ($counter > 2) {
       echo "</td></tr><tr>";
       echo "<td class=1st>";
}
if ($counter > 3) {
       echo "</td></tr><tr>";
       echo "<td class=2nd>";
}
if ($counter > 4) {
       echo "</td></tr><tr>";
       echo "<td class=1st>";
}

now that is working, but that's the LONG way, how can I make it with just 1 if statement?

any helps appreciated, thanks 😃

[ir4z0r]

    $counter = 0;
    while($row = mysql_fetch_array($homeql))
    {
      echo '</td></tr><tr><td class=';
      if (!($counter++)%2) echo '2nd>';  else echo '1st>';
    }

[toma42]

Using smarty (smarty.php.net)
{cycle values="1st,2nd"}

Or, if you continue to code without using smarty (bad idea)

echo ($dummy = !$dummy) ? '1st': '2nd';

[dv6cougar]

echo ($counter = !$counter) ? '1st>': '2nd>';

that worked! however, how does that work? i'm a bit lost

..... nevermind i thin i get it, let's see if i do

your saying is counter = not counter ? '1st>': //echo 1st> if it is but(: )?? if it's not '2nd>';

am I right?

thanks, i'm a bit fuzzy on it, but it did work 🙂

[mystrymaster]

toma - so why again is coding without smarty a bad idea

[The_Chancer]

If you use a count / for type

$count=mysql_num_rows($homeql)
for($i=0;$i<$count;$i++)
while($row = mysql_fetch_array($homeql))
{
    $bg=($i%2)?'#cccccc':'#dddddd';
    echo "<tr bgcolor=$bg> ......";
}

always works, and only 2 lines... - you can't really complain at it...

[toma42]

echo ($counter = !$counter) ? '1st>': '2nd>';

Ok, here's how that code works:

the ($counter = !$counter) means, in english:

assign the variable $counter to the opposite of the value of $counter. So, if $counter is set to false, !$counter will equal true. The evaluation of !$counter is done before assigning that value to $counter.

So, with each iteration, $counter is set to the opposite of what it was set to before. That is, if counter was true before this call, it will be false after it.

Here's a messy long way to do the same thing

$counter = !$counter; // flip boolean value for counter
echo ($counter == true) ? '1st': '2nd';

get it?

[toma42]

Originally posted by mystrymaster
toma - so why again is coding without smarty a bad idea

Because it makes maintance harder and overall development time is longer. By learning the simple concepts which make smarty useful, it's very easy to make flexible, powerful applications quickly (definatly more quickly than using embedded php).

dv6cougar wrote:

your saying is counter = not counter ? '1st>': //echo 1st> if it is but(: )?? if it's not '2nd>';

No. I'm using only one = so it's an assignment operator, not an evaluation operator (==).

[dv6cougar]

toma, thanks! i get it now 🙂

smarty.php.net seems cool, no time to look at it now though 🙁

will later 🙂