uhm...

Zack

I have written a news/blog code for a flat-file database and I want to add a comments system. Each line of news looks like this:

postID | Date | Title | News

And each comment line looks like this:

Now, the code to view the comments is what I am having problems with. If you go here: http://junker.org/~zshornick/addcomment.php?postID=1 , you can see the news/blog item with $postID=1 on top and the add comment form on the bottom. In the middle, I want to display all of the comments with the same postID as the post, but right now I can only make it show all of the comments. I also wrote code that showed one comment at time where the $postID was equal to the $commentID of the comment, but I lost it. Here is the code if anyone can help me out. I apologize for it not being too clean or commented...

Also, ignore $content_table and $body_dark... they are for a skin/color chooser code I wrote and am using for the template...

addcomment.php:


<?

if($HTTP_POST_VARS['submit']) {
        if(!$HTTP_POST_VARS['comment']) {
            echo "You must enter a comment.";
            exit;
        }
        if(strstr($HTTP_POST_VARS['name'],"|")) {
            echo "Title cannot contain the pipe symbol: |";
            exit;
        }
        if(strstr($HTTP_POST_VARS['comment'],"|")) {
            echo "News cannot contain the pipe symbol: |";
            exit;
        }
        $fp = fopen('private/comments.txt','a');
        if(!$fp) {
            echo "Error opening file!";
            exit;
        }
        $line = $HTTP_POST_VARS['parentID'];
		$line .= "|" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['commentID'];
		$line .= "|" . date("m.d.y");
		$line .= "|" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['name'];
		$line .= "|" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['email'];
		$line .= "|" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['url'];
        $line .= "|" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['comment'];
        $line = str_replace("\r\n","<BR>",$line);
        $line .= "\r\n";
        fwrite($fp, $line);
        if(!fclose($fp)) {
            echo "Error closing file!";
            exit;
        }  

		header("Location: addcomment.php?postID=" . $HTTP_POST_VARS['parentID']);       

    } 

  $data = file('private/news.txt'); 
       $element = trim($data[$postID]); 
       $pieces = explode("|",$element);
    echo ?> 
<table border=0 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width=550 frame=void rules=none>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'> &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<font face='Arial' size=3><b><i><? echo stripslashes($pieces[2]) ?></i></b></font> 
      <hr color="<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>" size="2" width="80%" align="left"></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>' valign="top" align="justify"><div align="justify"> 
        <font face='Arial' size=2><? echo stripslashes($pieces[3]) ?></font> </div></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 valign=middle align=right bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'> 
      <font face='Arial' size=1><i>Post ID: <? echo $pieces[0] ?></i> <br>
      <i>Posted by Zack on <? echo $pieces[1] ?></i></font></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
</table>
<br>



<?
     ;

$i=-1; 

$fd = fopen ("private/comments.txt", "r"); 
while (!feof($fd)) { 
$i++; 
$buffer = fgets($fd, 4096);
}

?> 
<hr color="<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>" size="2" width="80%" align="left">
<?
$data = file('private/comments.txt');
foreach($data as $element) {
    $element = trim($element);
    $pieces = explode("|", $element);
echo
 ?>
<table border=0 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width=550 frame=void rules=none>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>' valign="top" align="justify"><div align="justify"> 
        <font face='Arial' size=2><? echo stripslashes($pieces[6]) ?></font> </div></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 valign=middle align=right bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'> 
      <font face='Arial' size=1><i>Post ID: <? echo $pieces[0] ?></i> <br>
	  <i>Comment ID: <? echo $pieces[1] ?></i> <br>
      <i>Posted by <? echo $pieces[3] ?> on <? echo $pieces[2] ?></i> <br>
	  <i>E-Mail Address: <? echo $pieces[4] ?></i> <br>
	  <i>Website URL: <? echo $pieces[5] ?></i></font></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
    <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'>
	<hr color="<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>" size="2" width="80%" align="left"></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr> 
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
</table>
<br>
<?
    ;
 }
?>
<hr color="<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>" size="2" width="80%" align="left">
<FORM ACTION="<?=$PHP_SELF?>" METHOD="POST" NAME="newsentry">
Your Name:<BR>
<INPUT TYPE="text" SIZE="30" NAME="name"><BR>
E-Mail Address:<BR>
<INPUT TYPE="text" SIZE="30" NAME="email"><BR>
Website:<BR>
<INPUT TYPE="text" SIZE="30" NAME="url"><BR>
Comments:<BR>
<TEXTAREA NAME="comment" COLS="40" ROWS="5"></TEXTAREA><BR><BR>
<input type="hidden" name="parentID" value="<? print $postID; ?>">
<input type="hidden" name="commentID" value="<? print $i; ?>">
<INPUT TYPE="submit" NAME="submit" VALUE="Post Comment"><BR>
</FORM>

Thanks in advance...

Zack

anyone?... please?.. i'm out of ideas..

Natty_Dreadlock

I don't know where u read the comments u wanna display, but i assume it's one of the foreach-loops?! So in a foreach loop, use an if-condition and see whether the postId equals the articles postId and output all lines that match this condition...

barand

In the middle of your code, change

$data = file('private/comments.txt');
foreach($data as $element) {
$element = trim($element);
$pieces = explode("|", $element);
echo

$data = file('private/comments.txt');
foreach($data as $element) {
$element = trim($element);
$pieces = explode("|", $element);
if ($pieces[0]==$postId ) echo

Zack

i tired that multiple ways and got no results... at lest none that I was looking to get... thanks though...

any other ideas?

Zack

i tried switching the commentID and postID in the text file, but its still not working correctly.

any more ideas?

Zack

can anyone help? ive spent the entire day on this with no luck! please?

Natty_Dreadlock

$pieces = explode("|", $element);
echo
?>

Why is there an echo without any string following?? Maybe just leave it out, because the ?> switches php to html mode so there's no need to put an echo anymore...

Zack

the echo is there because I tried putting the html in a loop and so it needed to be included in the php... I just didnt want to have to put slashes in front of every single quote... im lazy...

so can ANYONE solve my problem? my php book doesn't really explain too much about text file databases... just MySQL

Natty_Dreadlock

no need to put the echo though... PHP will echo everything between <?php ?> several times when it's inside a loop... So give it a try.

Zack

the loop isnt really the problem... its getting the right comments to be shown... i think the problem is that im telling it to show lines with certain parent IDs, but there are multiple lines with the same parent ID, so it is going to each individual ID instead... i cannot figure out how to show all of the comments that belong to each post via parent ID. it just overrides and shows based on comment ID... please help me solve this problem....

barand

Replace your section with this

<?
$data = file('private/comments.txt');
foreach($data as $element) {
    $element = trim($element);
    $pieces = explode("|", $element);
    if ($pieces[0]==$postId ) {
 ?>
<table border=0 cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 width=550 frame=void rules=none>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>' valign="top" align="justify"><div align="justify">
        <font face='Arial' size=2><? echo stripslashes($pieces[6]) ?></font> </div></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 valign=middle align=right bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'>
      <font face='Arial' size=1><i>Post ID: <? echo $pieces[0] ?></i> <br>
      <i>Comment ID: <? echo $pieces[1] ?></i> <br>
      <i>Posted by <? echo $pieces[3] ?> on <? echo $pieces[2] ?></i> <br>
      <i>E-Mail Address: <? echo $pieces[4] ?></i> <br>
      <i>Website URL: <? echo $pieces[5] ?></i></font></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
    <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'>
    <hr color="<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>" size="2" width="80%" align="left"></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$content_table"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
  <tr>
    <td width=10 height=10></td>
    <td width=520 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
    <td width=10 height=10 bgcolor='<? echo "$body_dark"; ?>'></td>
  </tr>
</table>
<br>
<?
   } // if
 } // foreach
?>

Zack

thanks, but Ive already tried that... it didnt post anything in the comments part of the page, even when there were comments that were related to that post...

Zack

anyone?

Zack

3 days now... no luck. Anyone have any other ideas? Or anyone know where I could look for some more help?

barand

Zack,

I created a couple of test files to you formats and I've also written a skeleton script for you to add the flesh to get the presentation styles that you want.

hth

Natty_Dreadlock

post your code and data files zipped... if u can wait one week or so, i will check it and try to get it goin....

Zack

wow, thanks guys... I thought i was doomed, haha...

Zack

barand, your code works great, but it still isn't exactly what I need. You fixed my problem of getting the correct comments to be under the correct posts, but now I can't figure out (with your code) how to only show a certain post with only that post's comments under it (mysite.com/page.php?postid=2 should show post 2 with the comments for post 2)...

barand

Just added a couple of lines (commented) to do that for you


$newsfile = file('news.txt');
$commentfile = file('comments.txt');

$requiredPost = $_GET['postid'];  /// GET the post you want to view

foreach ($newsfile as $item) {
         $elements = explode('|', $item);
         for ($i=0; $i<count($elements); $i++) {
              $elements[$i] = trim($elements[$i]);
         }
         list($postid, $ndate,$title, $news) = $elements;

     if ($postid==$requiredPost) {  /// test if it is the one you want

         echo "<br>";
         echo "<table><tr><th>ID</th><th>Date</th><th>Title</th><th>News</th></tr>\n";
         echo "<tr><td>$postid</td><td>$ndate</td><td>$title</td><td>$news</td></tr></table>\n";

         echo "<table style=\"border: 1px; border-style: solid; border-color: #CCCCCC\"><tr><th>Comment ID</th><th>Date</th><th>Name</th><th>Email</th><th>URL</th><th>Comment</th></tr>\n";

         foreach ($commentfile as $comment) {
                 $elements = explode('|', $comment);
                 for ($i=0; $i<count($elements); $i++) {
                      $elements[$i] = trim($elements[$i]);
                 }
                 list($cpostid,$comid, $cdate,$name, $email,$url,$ctext) = $elements;
                 if ($cpostid == $postid) {
                     echo "<tr><td>$comid</td><td>$cdate</td><td>$name</td><td>$email</td><td>$url</td><td>$ctext</td></tr>\n";
                 }
        }
        echo "</table>";
    } // if required
}

hth