Hi i'm fairly new to PHP and I am slowly trying to contruct a guestbook. My end aim is to have a simple guestbook that runs off MySQL, while also on the front page having some sort of small "Flash Box" that shows the first 3 or so entries truncated down to 100 characters or so.
Currently im working off a tutorial that had me create a jokes database. I can get the jokes within the database to show up fine. What i want to do now is is to truncate them down. I currently have..
<?php
//Checks to see If a connection can be made to the MySQL server and displays the appropriate message
$connect = @mysql_connect('localhost', 'root', '*******');
if (!$connect) {
exit ('Wont Connect to MySQL Server');
} else {
echo 'Connected to my SQL Server<br><br><hr><br>';
}
//Checks to see if a connection can be made to the database IJDB and displays appropriate message
mysql_select_db('ijdb', $connect);
if (!@mysql_select_db('ijdb')) {
exit ('Wont Connect to Joke Database');
} else {
echo 'Connected to my Joke Database<br><br><hr><br>';
}
?>
<?php
//Retrieves Jokes and loads them into array
$result = @mysql_query('SELECT joketext, jokedate FROM joke');
//Displays the loaded jokes
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
echo $row['joketext'].'<br>';
echo $row['jokedate']. '<br><br>';
}
?>
This works fine and shows the jokes as expected. I've been working with the following function, and while i don't understand exactly how it works, I understand what it does.
<?php
function truncate($string, $del) {
$len = strlen($string);
if ($len > $del) {
$new = substr($string,0,$del)."...";
return $new;
}
else return $string;
}
?>
<?php
$arg = "Hello World. How are you?";
echo $arg."<br>";
echo truncate($arg, 6)."<br>";
echo truncate($arg, 7)."<br>";
?>
I can't figure out how to integrate it into
echo $row['joketext'].'<br>';
I've tried various things, but I think im having problems as that is based on a single variable and I want to use it against ALL jokes that come out of the joketext field.
Any help would be appreciated.
Thanks
Richard