[RESOLVED] adding line breaks and rownum

msimonds

I have the following script that I cannot figure out how to correct a problem on.

If a category has less than 3 stories then it messes up the page layout on my personal blog.

here is the script for this page:

<?php
						$cid = mysql_fetch_object(mysql_query('SELECT id FROM blog_entries_categories WHERE title="' . $_GET['id'] .'"'));

                    $query = "SELECT blog_id, title, entry, DATE_FORMAT(date_entered, '%M %e, %Y') AS formatted_date
                              FROM blog_entries WHERE cat_id=" . $cid->id . " ORDER BY blog_id DESC LIMIT 3";
                    if ($r = mysql_query ($query))  // Run the query.
                    {
                    	// Retrieve and print every record.
                    	while ($row = mysql_fetch_array ($r))
                        {
                            list($id, $title, $entry, $date) = $row;
                            //$date = date("F d, Y");
                            $title      = htmlspecialchars($title);
                            $title2     = trim(strtolower(str_replace(' ', '-', $title)));
                            $entry      = nl2br($entry);
                            $cut        = substr($entry, 0, 300);
                            $new_text   = substr($cut, 0, strrpos($cut, ' '));
                            echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />
                    		<p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl . "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br />";
                    	}
                        echo '<a href="' . $rooturl . 'categoryarchive.php?catid=' . $cid->id . '">View all News in this category</a>';
                    }
                    else
                    { // Query didn't run.
                    	die ('<p>Could create the table because: <b>' . mysql_error() . "</b>. The query was $query.</p>");
                    } // End of query IF.
                    ?>

How can I add a COUNT to the query so that I can add an IF statement to check to see if the ROWNUM is > 3 then add some line breaks to the template

Hope this makes sense!

Regards,
mike

laserlight

You can use [man]mysql_num_rows/man

msimonds

I did not think about that, Thanks

BUT

I added that to the following code:

if ($r = mysql_query($query)) // Run the query.
{
    // Retrieve and print every record.
    while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($r))
    {
        list($id, $title, $entry, $date) = $row;
        //$date = date("F d, Y");
        $title = htmlspecialchars($title);
        $title2 = trim(strtolower(str_replace(' ', '-', $title)));
        $entry = nl2br($entry);
        $cut = substr($entry, 0, 300);
        $num_rows = mysql_num_rows($r);
        $new_text = substr($cut, 0, strrpos($cut, ' '));
        if ($num_rows > 3)
        {
            echo "Not enough stories";
        }
        else
        {
            echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />{$num_rows}<br />
                        		<p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl . "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br />";
        }
    }
    echo '<a href="' . $rooturl . 'categoryarchive.php?catid=' . $cid->id .
        '">View all News in this category</a>';
}

and it returns the correct $num_rows count but if the mysql_num_rows is less than 3, it still performs the ELSE statement

What am I doing wrong!

leatherback

you are testing for $numrows > 3 instead of <3.

that being said.. A lot can be tweaked on your code...

First of all.. Why do you have all the processing on your variables? Ideally you do these things before inserting the variables, so you minimize processing for displaying (Which is going to be the most frequent process).

Fruthermore:
please
$num_rows = mysql_num_rows($r);
outside the while loop

msimonds

leatherback wrote:
you are testing for $numrows > 3 instead of <3.

I fixed that, just a stupid mistake, thanks .....

leatherback wrote:
that being said.. A lot can be tweaked on your code...

First of all.. Why do you have all the processing on your variables? Ideally you do these things before inserting the variables, so you minimize processing for displaying (Which is going to be the most frequent process).

Not sure I get you here, but please share this with me, I am always into learning and improving

leatherback wrote:
Fruthermore:
please
$num_rows = mysql_num_rows($r);
outside the while loop

Done but in the following code:


if ($r = mysql_query($query)) // Run the query.
{
    $num_rows = mysql_num_rows($r);
    // Retrieve and print every record.
    while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($r))
    {
        list($id, $title, $entry, $date) = $row;
        //$date = date("F d, Y");
        $title = htmlspecialchars($title);
        $title2 = trim(strtolower(str_replace(' ', '-', $title)));
        $entry = nl2br($entry);
        $cut = substr($entry, 0, 290);
        $new_text = substr($cut, 0, strrpos($cut, ' '));
        if ($num_rows == 0)
        {
            echo "<h1>There are no stories in this category</h1><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />";
        }
        else
            if ($num_rows == 1)
            {
                echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />
                                <p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl . "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br /><br />
                                <br />\n<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />";
            }
            else
                if ($num_rows == 2)
                {
                    echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />
                                <p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl . "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />";
                }
                else
                    if ($num_rows <= 3)
                    {
                        echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />
                                    <p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl .
                            "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br />";
                    }
                    else
                    {

                    echo "<h1>{$title}</h1>{$date}<br />
                                <p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"" . $rooturl .
                        "$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br />";
                }
}
echo '<a href="' . $rooturl . 'categoryarchive.php?catid=' . $cid->id .
    '">View all News in this category</a>';
}

if a category does not have any articles in it, according to this code, it should return the first IF statement, that is not working, but the rest is

example 1 story > http://www.mikesimonds.com/parenting/ (working per code)

example 3 stories > http://www.mikesimonds.com/people/ (working per code)

example no stories > http://www.mikesimonds.com/techincal/ (not working)

thanks so much for the help, i appreciate it!

leatherback

ahhh! ;-)

why all the <br /> !?
Use CSS for your formatting. Never, ever, never just junk out all these <br />!

Oh, and again the same mistake:
if ($num_rows <= 3)
if ($num_rows >= 3)

msimonds

Yes I need to improve my css

but why is the first part of the php

if ($num_rows == 0)
        {
            echo "<h1>There are no stories in this category</h1><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />
                                <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />";
        }

not working!

It should do that check first

leatherback

Hi, I had a bit of a cleaning session on your code. Have a look and see whwether you like it.

I did not change the processing you do on the data from the database. I doubt you need all of it, and I thinkyou should reconsider the flow of your data through the database, but well. THat's just me.

Hope this works for you; cant test it, as I do not have your database & queries. Should be close though.


$r = mysql_query($query); // Run the query.
if($r)
  {
  $num_rows = mysql_num_rows($r);
  if($num_rows == 0)
    {
	echo "<h1>There are no stories in this category</h1>";
	}
  else
    {
	$i = 1;
	if($num_rows >= 2)
	  {
	  $i = 2;
	  }

// Retrieve and print every record.
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($r))
  {
  //$date = date("F d, Y"); <= do this in the SQL: "select DATE_FORMAT(date, '%F %d, %Y ') as date ..."
  $title    = htmlspecialchars($row['title']);
  $title2   = trim(strtolower(str_replace(' ', '-', $row['title'])));
  $entry    = nl2br($row['entry']);
  $cut      = substr($entry, 0, 290);
  $new_text = substr($cut, 0, strrpos($cut, ' '));

  echo "<h1>".$title."</h1>".$row['date']."
        <p>".$new_text."<br />
		  <a href=\"" . $rooturl."title".$i.".html\">
		    View full story
		  </a>
		</p>";
  }

  echo "<a href=\"" . $rooturl . "categoryarchive.php?catid=" . $id .
    "\">View all News in this category</a>";
} 
  }

?>

msimonds

leatherback - Thanks that is a great start, i testted it and it works!!

Thanks so much! I need to make a few minor adjustments, but i think this is perfect 😃