Blank Records?

maya28

Hi everyone! I'm really new to PHP, so please bare with me. I tried to search the archives, but I'm not even sure what to look for. I hope you can help! I have a very simple page that basically lists the title, subtitle, first paragraph and then a link to a "full story". It works perfectly, except when a story does not have a subtitle. Then there's just this blank space where a subtitle SHOULD be. Is there a way to make it so that the "first" moves up and replaces that space if there is no subtitle? I don't even know if that makes sense, but if anyone understands and can help a girl out, that'd be so cool of you!!!!!

thanks a bunch!
maya 😃

<? 
$host="hostname";
$user="username";
$password="password";
$dbname="dbname";
$dbtable="news";

$dbh=mysql_connect ("hostname", "username", "password") or die ('I cannot connect to the database because: ' . mysql_error()); 
mysql_select_db ("dbname"); 
?> 
<table width="100%" border="0" align="center" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="0">
<? 
$sql = "SELECT id, date, title, subtitle, first, body, image  FROM " . $dbtable . " ORDER BY date DESC LIMIT 4;"; 
$result = mysql_query($sql, $dbh) or die( mysql_error() ); 
while($rows = mysql_fetch_array($result)){ 

print "$rows[title]"; 
print "$rows[subtitle]<br>";
print "$rows[first]"; 
print "<a href=\"/news/news.php?id=" . $rows[id] . "\">" . '[Full Story]' .  "</a>";   

} 
?>
</table>

thorpe

while($rows = mysql_fetch_array($result)){ 
  print $rows['title'];
  if ($rows['subtitle'] != '') {
    print $rows['subtitle']."<br>";
  }
  print $rows['first']; 
  print "<a href=\"/news/news.php?id=".$rows['id']."\">" . '[Full Story]' .  "</a>";   

}

maya28

That worked perfectly, although I forgot one important part - a small image that will be "left aligned" next to either the subtitle, or the first paragraph, depending on whether there is a subtitle or not.

So, Is there a way to make an "or" statement in php?
For example...say I wanted it to be:

Show me title, image, subtitle and first if the subtitle is NOT blank

OR , if the subtitle IS blank, Show me title, image, first.

This is what I have right now, but what's happening is that I'm getting 2 records for each story with a subtitle.


while($rows = mysql_fetch_array($result)){  


print "<h1$rows[title]</h1>";
if ($rows[subtitle] != '') { 
print "<img src='http://www.sitename.com/images/home/$rows[image].jpg' align='left'><p><b>$rows[subtitle]</b><br>"; 
print $rows[first];  

print "<a href=\"/news/news.php?id=".$rows[id]."\">" . '[Full Story]' .  "</p></a>";    

  } 



print "<h1$rows[title]</h1>";
if ($rows[subtitle] ='*') {
print "<img src='http://www.sitename.com/images/home/$rows[image].jpg' align='left'><p>";
print $rows[first];  

print "<a href=\"/news/news.php?id=".$rows[id]."\">" . '[Full Story]' .  "</p></a>";    

}}
?>
</table>

thorpe

while($rows = mysql_fetch_array($result)){ 
  print $rows['title'];
  if ($rows['subtitle'] != '') {
    print "<img src='http://www.sitename.com/images/home/$rows[image].jpg' align='left'>"
    print "<b>".$rows['subtitle']."</b><br>";
  }
  print $rows['first']; 
  print "<a href=\"/news/news.php?id=".$rows['id']."\">" . '[Full Story]' .  "</a>";   

}

maya28

The image works now, but only for articles that have a subtitle. If there's no subtitle, then the image doesn't show up. Am I missing something really obvious here? I'm sorry if I'm asking stupid questions, I'm very new to this stuff. I just want to make it so that there's always an image, regardless of whether there is a subtitle or not. Which I suppose would be easy if I didn't want it "left aligned" so it flows with the text.