Displaying a MySQL table with PHP without knowing the columns

huee77

I am semi-new to php/mysql. So be patient with me.

I am creating a site for someone else. In this site there is a table with mandatory questions, but I have given the site owner the ability to add new questions to the table. Now, I need to display the table for the site owner to see. I know how to display a regular table,

<table>
<tr>
<td>Email Address</td>
<td>First Name</td>
<td>Last Name</td>
</tr>
<?php do { ?>
<tr>
<td><?php echo $user['user_email']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $user['user_firstname']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $user['user_lastname']; ?></td>
</tr>
<?php } while ($user = mysql_fetch_assoc($user)); ?>
</table>

The problem is when the site owner adds questions, they will not show up, because I didn't know ahead of time. Obviously.

So what I think I need, and I don't know if it even exists, but almost a loop inside a loop. A loop for the columns and then for the rows. I hope I explained it good enough, because I don't even really know how to. Thanks

bradgrafelman

Well that depends on how well you structured your DB first of all. For example, how are new questions added? Do you just keep adding columns onto a table? If so, you should look into database normalizing so that you can actually manage the data more efficiently.

huee77

I agree, but it is the site owner adding the question. When they add a question it just adds a new column. The goal is less work for me. I don't want to constantly be looking to see what the customer wants and try to make the table work with another table. I want the site owner who knows nothing about programming and databases to add a question to a form and be able to view it in a table.

bradgrafelman

Which is exactly why you should normalize the schema. You could have a separate "questions" table and a form to add a new question would just add a new row. Then when you're displaying the table above, you'd first SELECT all of the questions for the form into an array in PHP. Then you'd have the number and names of the columns.