[RESOLVED] Crazy Little Array Problem.

[programguy28]

This is what I am trying to accomplish -

Display a "Quote of the Day" feature. I do not want it to display a random quote from the database everytime the page is displayed - I want one quote displayed there all day long. So I am trying to construct a script that will be run via crontab one a month on the first.

I have everything working now, but I am expriencing a problem I was not expecting- the random values are repeating themselves. When the script runs, I get duplicate values.

I searched PHP.net, but the only function that looks like it would work is array_unique(). Problem is, I am not sure how on earth to implement it correctly - does anyone have any suggestios? this is my code -

--> NOTE: DOM = Day of Month

<?php
//includes are here.

//Connect to Database
$dbConection = new DbConnect;

//Reset the Quote of the Day Order
$resetQuery = "UPDATE quotes SET dom = '0'";
mysql_query($resetQuery);

//Randomize it
$getQuotesQuery = "SELECT id FROM quotes";
$getQuotesResults = mysql_query($getQuotesQuery);

WHILE($row = mysql_fetch_array($getQuotesResults))
{

	$dbArray[] = $row['id'];

}


FOR($i = 1; $i < count($dbArray); $i++)
{
	$randArray = array_rand($dbArray, 21);

	$num = ($i - 1);

	$randNum = $randArray[$num];

	$updateQuery = "UPDATE quotes SET dom = '$randNum' WHERE id = '$i'";

	IF(mysql_query($updateQuery))
	{
		PRINT "Success<br>Query:<br>$updateQuery<br><br>";
	}

	ELSE
	{
		PRINT "Failure<br>";
		echo mysql_error();
		PRINT "<br> Query is:<br>$updateQuery";
	}

}//End For Loop

PRINT "<br>Database Array Containing ID's:<br>";
print_r($dbArray);

PRINT "<br>Random Array Containing Random DOMS:<br>";
print_r($randArray);


?>

[programguy28]

Nevermind - Found something that will work -

shuffle()!!

[devinemke]

i suggest a simpler approach:

mysql_query('UPDATE quotes SET dom = 0') or exit(mysql_error());
$select_result = mysql_query('SELECT id FROM quotes ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 31') or exit(mysql_error());
$dom = 1;
while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($select_result))
{
	$update_result = mysql_query("UPDATE quotes SET dom = $dom WHERE id = " . $row['id']) or exit(mysql_error());
	$dom++;
}

if i understand you correctly you want the quotes to reset on the first of each month, right? i assume that your quotes table has more than 31 records. my code above will only generate dom's for 31 random records. no need to do more than 31 if you want to reset each month.