[RESOLVED] A few probs... 1st is Zfeeder...

[virginiamonkeys]

I've developed a site with zfeeder before but this other site I'm trying to do is a bit more tricky.

I have no problems incorporating it in my code like this:

http://www.monkeywithatypewriter.com/images/index.gif

It works.

But I want to NOT have the zfeeder on my home page, and instead have the newsfeeds on inside pages. I can get it working like this:

http://www.monkeywithatypewriter.com/images/33770template.gif

But it's not going to do.

Basically, what I want to do is put the zfeeder code like this. (It won't work. I tried.)

Looking at the 2nd of the above 2 pictures:

Underneath "$town News" in the "templates/towntemplate.php" I want a "$localnews".

Then in the top part of the page:

$localnews = "<? $_GET['zfposition']='$feeds'; include('../newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>"

I've tried all sorts of variations and it won't work.

The reason I want to do this is because each page will have it's own news column from a differend source, and the $feeds is supposed to identify which story to load into the news column.

How do I do this?

[virginiamonkeys]

Let me rephrase the question.

I want to have this:

In a file called "templates/towntemplate.php"

<? php
some php stuff here
<H2>$town News</H2>
$localnews
more php stuff here
?>

And in a file called "areas/page1.php"

<? php
some php stuff here
$localnews = "<?php $_GET['zfposition']='$feeds'; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>"
more php stuff here
?>

This isn't working.

Probably because I have a <?php inside a <?php.

But I tried this quite a few different ways and can't figure it out. What is the proper way to do this?

[virginiamonkeys]

Is this answer so easy that nobody bothers to answer, or so tough nobody knows?

[devinemke]

virginiamonkeys wrote:

...Probably because I have a <?php inside a <?php.
But I tried this quite a few different ways and can't figure it out. What is the proper way to do this?

you've answered your own question. you cannot nest PHP open/close tags. enclose any PHP code with the tags <?php ... ?>. and non-PHP code, don't.

[virginiamonkeys]

If I do it this way:

<?php

SNIP...


<H2>$town News</H2>

$localnews

$_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');

<H2>Our News</H2>

...SNIP

?>

I get this:

Parse error: parse error, expecting `T_STRING' or `T_VARIABLE' or `T_NUM_STRING' in I:\apachefriends\xampp\htdocs\Test.\templates\towntemplate.php on line 67

[virginiamonkeys]

I even changed the double quotes around "$feeds" to single quotes and get the same error.

[devinemke]

SNIP...
<H2>$town News</H2>
$localnews

...this is not valid PHP code

[virginiamonkeys]

If I remove the line:

$_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');

Everything parses fine. The town name fills in, and it looks exactly as it should.

As soon as I try adding the newsfeeder to this page with the above line, or any combination thereof (I've tried many, many variations of this line), it screws up.

However, if it's added to the template page, it works fine. I DON'T want it on the template page though because I need to customize the news feed and also don't want a news feed on the home page.

[virginiamonkeys]

As for the "this is not valid PHP code" comment, to clairify the PHP code I have mentioned here, the page basically looks like this:

<?php
$file = file('../includes/random_content.txt'); 
$random_8 = array_rand($file, 8); 
$random = '';
foreach ($random_8 as $value) 
{ 
    $random .= $file[$value]; 
}
$pagetitle = "$town $zip $state ($stabv) Service";
$articletitle = "<H1>$town Service</H1>";
$keywords = "$town, $county, $zip, $state";
$description = "We service the $town $zip, $state area.";
$mappic = "<CENTER>
<img src='images/$map' width='463' height='353' alt='Map of $town $zip $state'></CENTER>";
$someservices ="
<P>Some services we provide include:
<UL>
$random
<LI>and more... just ask!</LI>
</UL>
";
$contents = "
<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top' width='463' height='353'>$mappic</TD>
<TD valign='top'><P>Areas Serviced in $town by Us<BR>
Contact Us<BR>
$town Traffic<BR>
$town Weather<BR>
$town News<BR>
Other News<BR>
Links of Interest<BR></P>
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Areas Serviced in $town by Us</H2>

<P>Some of the areas serviced in and around the $town area include:
$list</P>
</TD>

<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Services Provided</H2>
$someservices 
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

$contactinfo $lockform

<H2>$town Traffic</H2>

$traffic

<H2>$town Weather</H2>

$weather

<H2>$town News</H2>


<H2>Our News</H2>

<H2>Links of Interest</H2>

links
";
?>

and I wanted to put the line

<?php $_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>

Under the News section like this:

$weather

<H2>$town News</H2>

$_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');

<H2>Locksmith News</H2>

As I mentioned, I tried different combinations of quotes, positioning, etc.

[virginiamonkeys]

Okay, I got myself around part of the problem, but still cannot make it work.

I turned the

<?php $_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>

into 2 statements.

I have this:

<?php
$town = "TOWN";
$state = "STATE";
$county = "COUNTY";
$stabv = "ST";
$zip = "ZIP";
$feeds = "p1";

SNIP...

$localnews = $_GET['zfposition']='$feeds';
$localnewsinclude = include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');
?>

But now my page returns this in its place

$feeds
1

Now that I don't get the error, I can see I'm getting closer, but I don't know why I'm getting the results I am.

Can ANYBODY help?

[LoganK]

$_GET['zfposition']="$feeds";

Why are you assigning a value to $_GET?

[virginiamonkeys]

I don't know. I'm just trying to get the newsreader to work from the documentation they provided here:

http://zvonnews.sourceforge.net/zfeeder.php

[virginiamonkeys]

Oh... I'm going to pull my hair out!

[virginiamonkeys]

If I change this:

<?php
$town = "TOWN";
$state = "STATE";
$county = "COUNTY";
$stabv = "ST";
$zip = "ZIP";
$feeds = "p1";

SNIP...

$localnews = $_GET['zfposition']='$feeds';
$localnewsinclude = include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');
?> 

to this:

<?php
$town = "TOWN";
$state = "STATE";
$county = "COUNTY";
$stabv = "ST";
$zip = "ZIP";
$feeds = "p1";

SNIP...

$localnewsinclude = include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');
?> 

without the:

$localnews = $_GET['zfposition']='$feeds';

It displays news... but it's at the very top of my page outside of the table (not in the place it's supposed to be) and all my news feeds display (not just the "p1" or "p2" or whatever feed I require.

[LoganK]

However, assigning a variable the results of include() isn't going to do anything at all. Include will output the page, then assign the variable a 1 or a 0 depending on whether or not the include failed. So you can get rid of the "$localnewsinclude = " part, and just say "include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');". As for the location, just put this small PHP snippet where in the HTML code the news feed has to go:

<? include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>

Like this:

<html>
<head>
<...>
<blah blah html code>
<table>
<tr><td><? include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>
</td></tr>
</table>
</blah blah html code>
</...>
</head>
</html>

[virginiamonkeys]

Okay... tried that... it won't work. That's basically how I was doing it from the start. With the exception that I had the $_GET part added to it.

Now it won't show at all. Nothing. The page loads, but the feed isn't there.

What's also wrong with the code you gave in your reply is the fact that the feed doesn't have the "$feeds" anywhere in there. The reason for that string is that $feeds can be p1, p2, p3, p4, or anything, any combination of the aforementioned.

If your example were to work, ALL of my feeds would end up being displayed.

But... it's not working.

What may help is knowing that this is being put into a php file that is being called into my template.

Example...

$feeds, $towns, $whatever is defined in a file unique to each page.

That file gets called into a "content" file where the designated $feeds, $towns, $whatever is replaced and it is this content file that I want the newsfeeder to load the feeds. All this is called $content (There is some HTML within this file, but it is a php file.)

That combination of files gets called into the "template" file where all the other standard HTML is built and the $content is inserted into the page.

The reason for this is because I want 1 standard looking page for my whole site. Much easier to change the looks on one page.

However, some pages will have newsfeeds, some won't. Some will have different advertising, and other features such as traffic, weather, etc. The pages that don't have this stuff will be fairly plain and generic. The only difference between these pages and the other pages is the lack of this "content". So I have a "content" file with all this stuff that gets inserted into a standard "template" file.

Recap... about 30 pages will be standard "template" with generic content.

About 300+ pages will be the "template" page with all kinds of area specific content.

So if one were to call a file from a URL (say a generic page like index.php) it would go like this...

Index.php would call for the index content file with all the variables. It would then call the template file and the result would be displayed.

However... if you were to call a file with the content (special-page.php) it would go something like this...

special-page.php would call for the special-page file with the variables. These variables would be loaded into a content file. The template file is called and the result of the content is then placed into the template and then displayed.

[virginiamonkeys]

How many days is it typical to work at a snippet of code before one gets it working correctly?

This is what I have done so far:

I've changed my template to include both versions of my site by using the isset function. That way, if $town is set, I prints one part of my template differently than if it was not set:

template.php

<?php
include ("config.php");
$header = "This";
$pagefooter = "That";
?>
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<?php print ($url); ?>
<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="<?php print ($keywords); ?>">
<META NAME="description" CONTENT="<?php print ($description); ?>">
<META NAME="MSSmartTagsPreventParsing" CONTENT="TRUE">
<title><?php print ($pagetitle); ?></title>
<LINK REL=StyleSheet HREF="stylesheets/stylesheet.css" type="text/css">
<LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON" HREF="favicon.ico">
</head>

<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">

<center>
<table width="100%" height="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" bgcolor="e0c8e0" class="maintable">

<!-- top header begin -->

<tr bgcolor="4c004b">
	<td width="160" height="100">LOGO HERE</td>
	<td align="right" height="100" background="">HEADER HERE</td>
</tr>

<!-- top header end -->

<!-- menu and 1st section begin -->

<tr bgcolor="e0c8e0" background="">

	<!-- menu begin -->

	<td width="160" height="340" bgcolor="4c004b" background="" valign="top">

	<div id='MenuPos' style='position:relative; width:160; height:340;'><img src='images/transparent.gif' width='160' height='360'></div>		
<!-- menu end -->
		</td>

	<!-- 1st text begin -->

	<td height="340" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="e0c8e0" background="">

	<?php print ($articletitle); ?>
	<?php print ($header); ?>


<?php
if (isset ($town)) {

print "

<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top' width='463' height='353'>$mappic</TD>
<TD valign='top'><P>Areas Serviced in $town<BR>
Contact<BR>
$town Traffic<BR>
$town Weather<BR>
$town News<BR>
Other News<BR>
Links of Interest<BR></P>
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Areas Serviced in $town</H2>

<P>Some of the areas serviced in and around the $town area include:
$list</P>
</TD>

<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Services Provided</H2>
$someservices
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

$contactinfo $lockform

<H2>$town Traffic</H2>

$traffic

<H2>$town Weather</H2>

$weather

<H2>$town News</H2>








<H2>Other News</H2>

<H2>Links of Interest</H2>

";

} else {

print ($contents);

}

?>

	</td>

</tr>

	<?php print ($pagefooter); ?>

	</td>

</tr>


</table>
</center>

</body>
</html>

I want to put

<?php $_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>

in that big empty space in that code above under "$town News".

I tried it with the php tags, without the php tags, etc. It won't work.

I have 1 other main file at present that works with this page.

For instance...

townname.php

(this is what the URL will be such as www.mysite.com/townname.php)

townname.php contains all the $town, $state, etc variables and then calls the template.php and fills in the page.

Where am I supposed to put that one line of code into?

Many, many days later I still do not know... I've tried everything I can think of and research.

[LoganK]

virginiamonkeys wrote:

I want to put

<?php $_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php'); ?>

in that big empty space in that code above under "$town News".

Well, you seem to have answered your own question, haven't you?

<?php
include ("config.php");
$header = "This";
$pagefooter = "That";
?>
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/strict.dtd">
<html>
<head>
<?php print ($url); ?>
<META NAME="keywords" CONTENT="<?php print ($keywords); ?>">
<META NAME="description" CONTENT="<?php print ($description); ?>">
<META NAME="MSSmartTagsPreventParsing" CONTENT="TRUE">
<title><?php print ($pagetitle); ?></title>
<LINK REL=StyleSheet HREF="stylesheets/stylesheet.css" type="text/css">
<LINK REL="SHORTCUT ICON" HREF="favicon.ico">
</head>

<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">

<center>
<table width="100%" height="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" bgcolor="e0c8e0" class="maintable">

<!-- top header begin -->

<tr bgcolor="4c004b">
	<td width="160" height="100">LOGO HERE</td>
	<td align="right" height="100" background="">HEADER HERE</td>
</tr>

<!-- top header end -->

<!-- menu and 1st section begin -->

<tr bgcolor="e0c8e0" background="">

	<!-- menu begin -->

	<td width="160" height="340" bgcolor="4c004b" background="" valign="top">

	<div id='MenuPos' style='position:relative; width:160; height:340;'><img src='images/transparent.gif' width='160' height='360'></div>		
<!-- menu end -->
		</td>

	<!-- 1st text begin -->

	<td height="340" align="left" valign="top" bgcolor="e0c8e0" background="">

	<?php print ($articletitle); ?>
	<?php print ($header); ?>


<?php
if (isset ($town)) {

print "

<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top' width='463' height='353'>$mappic</TD>
<TD valign='top'><P>Areas Serviced in $town<BR>
Contact<BR>
$town Traffic<BR>
$town Weather<BR>
$town News<BR>
Other News<BR>
Links of Interest<BR></P>
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

<TABLE>
<TR>
<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Areas Serviced in $town</H2>

<P>Some of the areas serviced in and around the $town area include:
$list</P>
</TD>

<TD valign='top'>
<H2>Services Provided</H2>
$someservices
</TD>
</TR>
</TABLE>

$contactinfo $lockform

<H2>$town Traffic</H2>

$traffic

<H2>$town Weather</H2>

$weather

<H2>$town News</H2>




";

$_GET['zfposition']="$feeds"; include($basedir.'/newsfeeds/zfeeder.php');



print "<H2>Other News</H2>

<H2>Links of Interest</H2>

";

} else {

print ($contents);

}

?>

	</td>

</tr>

	<?php print ($pagefooter); ?>

	</td>

</tr>


</table>
</center>

</body>
</html>

[virginiamonkeys]

Oh you rock!

That works exactly like it's supposed to.

I can't believe that I didn't try that combination. :queasy:

For all Newbies I do recommend this:

http://www.hudzilla.org/phpbook/index.php

I'm on chapter 4 right now and I've learned quite a bit.

To all who tried helping me with this problem, sorry for being so dense. I'm confident that when through this book I'll have more of a skillset than before.

[LoganK]

I've seen that book before - the only online PHP book. Very interesting read, although I don't have time to read books-on-computer - too much eye strain.