[Resolved] New Message Indicator

partypete

Hello all,

I have a small message system I built but have gotten stumped. I'd like to create an "Unread Messages" indicator. So if there are no unread messages, show one picture, if there are new unread messages, show a different picture.

So if I have a table like so:

USERNAME               MESSAGE_READ(Yes or No)
bob                          Y
suzy                         N
bob                          N
steve                        Y
steve                        Y
suzy                         N

I'd like the query to produce a list of unique Usernames and tell me if that Username has any "N" in the Message_Read field

So from the table above we have:

bob YN
steve YY
suzy NN

Therefore bob has an unread message and suzy has atleast one unread message. Based on this, I'd like the the query to produce some sort of output on which I can place an if statement in my page to display a picture or text indicating they whether they have a new message or not:

bob "You Have Unread Messages"
steve "No New Messages"
suzy "You Have Unread Messages"
etc...

Is this possible?

Thank you very much!
Peter

LordShryku

Sure, here's one way of doing it

$sql = "SELECT username,
               message_read
          FROM table
      ORDER BY username";
$res = mysql_query($sql) or die(mysql_error());
if(mysql_num_rows($res) > 0) {
   $hold  = ""; // placemark for name
   $array = array(); // blank array for results
   while($row = mysql_fetch_array($res)) {
      if($row['username'] != $hold) {
         $hold = $row['username'];
      }
      $array[$hold][] = $row['message_read']; // push results into array
   }

   // now read the results
   foreach($array as $k => $v) {
      if(in_array("N",$v)) {
         echo $k.", you have unread messages<br />";
      }
      else {
         echo $k.", you have no unread messages<br />";
      }
   }
}
else {
   echo "No rows found from query";
}

partypete

G*d dang LordShryku, You're a freakin' genius!!

That works perfectly. Looking at all the little envelopes(read/unread messages) and checkmarks(complete, incomplete to-do's) just makes me smile. 😃 As you can see, I already used it twice.

Thanks man!

Peter