[PHP, mysql] Arrays

[Craig82]

Hi everyone,

I'm new here and looking for some help, hope you don't mind. I'm using PHP and mysql.

I have a database that stores items. Let's just say for example I have:

ID, name, description, link, date added

Each item has a user rating. However, the user rating script I use doesn't store the value in the database. Instead, it saves it to a file on the server and opens it to read and get the value or to update it if a user makes a rating.

If I pull all the data from the database and loop it using a while loop, the rating script simply matches the ID with a file matching that ID, to display the user votes correctly.

My problem is, I offer the user various options to arrange the items in an order they wish, for example by name. I want to offer an option to arrange by user rating but because the values aren't stored in the database I can't just simply arrange it through my query, like I can with other options, example ORDER BY name.

I think what I need to do is add the values of the ratings to the array from the query and then arrange that array by 'user rating'. 😕

<-- previous code...
<?php

$result=mysql_query("SELECT * FROM entries") or die("Error, query failed");

while ($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result))
{
echo <div>;

$rater_id=$row['ID'];  // This matches the item id with a rating id to find the right file.

$rater_item_name=$row['name']; // This matches the item name with a rating name to find the right file.

include("rate/rater.inc.php"); // This is the user rating script that opens and closes the files for viewing or rating and also PRINTS the ratings.

echo </div>;
}
?>

The above cut-down code works fine like I said. The rating values are stored in

$rater_ratings

How do I add $rater_ratings to the $row array and then arrange the array by $rater_ratings? Or rather is it even possible?

But surely everything is possible... lol That's my attitude anyway lol

I hope I explained clearly, sorry if I didn't I'm rather new to this! :eek:

Any help appreciated! 😉
Craig.

[davidonpda]

Hi Craig,

Since you are already using a database, why not add the user ratings to the database? Especially since they are already associated to the item number? You can just add a couple of extra columns and store whatever rating information there is, like number of ratings, and average rating, etc.

Then you could sort with your existing SQL queries, and potentially simplify some portions of your code. If you have thousands of items, that means you have thousands of flat files. It may even save some storage space on the server haha.

[Craig82]

haha yea that's what I ended up doing 🙂 took a little doing but I made it in the end 😃

Thanks for your reply anyway!
Craig.