dealing with null records

[madhavr]

hi

i have a facility in my system to write notes for each record i am browsing through.

the code for the 'screen-notes' is as follows:

if ($query_result4) {

		while($row = @mysql_fetch_array($query_result4)) {
		 // check for screennotes
		 if ($row[Notes]) {
		 			// notes do exist so output the notes as a link
					 echo "<tr><td><a href='../ScreenInput.php?ScreenNote=".base64_encode($row[Notes])." &SupplierID=".$HiddenSupplierID."' target=_blank>'".$row[Notes]."'</a></td></tr>";
		 	} else {
					// notes do not exist so give default message
					echo "<tr><td><a href='../ScreenInput.php?ScreenNote=".base64_encode($row[Notes])." &SupplierID=".$HiddenSupplierID."' target=_blank>Enter Notes Here</a></td></tr>";
		 } // end if

		} // end while

	} // end if

i want to display the notes such that for ones where the notes exist i can edit them by pressing them (since the notes show as a url link). this part works fine using the above code.

however for those records where their is no notes i want to display a default message e.g. enter notes here so that when i click on that and edit that the notes for that will be updated accordingly. this isnt working at the moment and i am just getting blank in those records that dont have notes. to be more specific the else part of the if statement isnt working in the above code. any ideas?

[kevinsequeira]

change to if ($row[Notes]!="") {

reg
kevin

[madhavr]

hi mate i tried this one but it doesnt work

it just doesnt display anything for those records where notes is null

[kevinsequeira]

<?php
if ($query_result4) {
  while($row = @mysql_fetch_array($query_result4)) {
    echo "notes is ".$row['Notes']."<BR>";
    if ($row['Notes']!="") {
 	   echo "notes present";
    } else {
	    echo "no notes";
    }
  }
}
?>

whats the output ??

reg
kevin

[madhavr]

i get the notes appearing when i cross certain records on others where notes is not present its just empty.

i should note that the way in which notes is stored is in a seperate table called screen

when i am browsing through the client records the notes only appears for those notes where there is a note with a clientID foreign key.

to try and clarify more....

say i have 10 client records in a client table

i have a table called screen where it contains 3 records of notes relating to three different clients

so for when i am browsing through these 3 clients the notes appears however when i am browsing through others the notes do not appear just nothing.

i hope that makes sense.

[madhavr]

hi mate

i figured the solution to the problem

but its a bit weird

basically if i put in say a fourth note into the notes table (taking into account the above exmaple i gave you) but dont accutaly put anything into the note but only put in the foreign key (clientID) into the note table then whenn i browse the corresponding record it then shows enter note here.

so what i need to do is insert all clientIDs into the note table and then it should be cool.