re-using functions

sleightofhand

I'm trying to pull "building" types from a database and have it dynamically generate a form. The code work, the form displays, however, i've tried to re-use the code to display the "services" for another section of the form and it gets the following error:

Fatal error: Cannot redeclare get_checkbox_labels() (previously declared in /var/www/html/arch/architect_db_building_checkbox.php:21) in /var/www/html/arch/architect_db_services_checkbox.php on line 39

Here is my questions: how do i dump the value of the function so i can re-use it?

here is a sample of the code below:

  /* get the checkbox labels */
$skills = get_checkbox_labels("building");

  /* create the html code for a formatted set of
     checkboxes */
$html_skills = make_checkbox_html($skills, 2, 400, "skills[]", $checked=array());

echo "Check Off Building Types";

echo "$html_skills";

function get_checkbox_labels($table_name) {

  /* make an array */
  $arr = array();

  /* construct the query */
  $query = "SELECT * FROM $table_name";

  /* execute the query */
  $qid = mysql_query($query);

  /* each row in the result set will be packaged as
     an object and put in an array */
  while($row= mysql_fetch_object($qid)) {
    array_push($arr, $row);
  }

  return $arr;
}

cahva

As the error says, you have declared the function already earlier. So dump the other one 🙂

EDIT:
To elaborate myself, you can create the function itself only once but you can use it as many times as you like(thats the point anyways with functions).
Oh and BTW, use vB code tags when pasting code to this forum.

$skills = get_checkbox_labels("building");
$skills2 = get_checkbox_labels("other_building");

leatherback

Hi,

What I do to avoid this problem:

I have a library of my own functions, each in it's own file. And when I need a function in a piece of code, I [man]include_once[/man] this function. Basically this checks whether the page has used the include file before. If it has, it ignores the statement, and otherwise it will include the file. This way you can have files included in each page that you need them on, without having to worry about whether or not you already included the file (Which for function definitions would give you the error that you are seeing now).

It also adds value to your projects, as you can more easily re-use code. The next step would be to go fully object-oriented.