Re: [PHP] populate form input option dropdown box from existing data

jenai tomaka wrote:
> You can try like this,
>
> $row = stored data;
>  
> and write the options like this
> <option value="id" (id == $row ? "selected" : "") >xxxx</option>
>
>
> Yuri Yarlei.
>
> <http://brasil.microsoft.com.br/IE8/mergulhe/?utm_source=MSN%3BHotmail&utm_medium=Tagline&utm_campaign=IE8>
Yuri, I'm still "wet behind the ears" on this so I don't quite
understand what you mean by "stored data" ;  and what does the "id"
(id==$row?"selected":"") mean?
I get the idea that this might be translated into something in the code
I have dreamed up - further down.

echo "<option value=", $row['id'], ">", $row['category'], "</option><br />";
I suppose that I must add an if clause to insert the selected option for
the categories that are relevant...


Gentlemen,
I have been diligently studying all this and have just returned my
attention to the list, so I've read the replies/inputs and now comment:

BTW, I had some problems with the multiple statement - it does not take
any parameters; it must simply be stated multiple without quotes.

Now, I was happy to learn that it is simpler to populate the insert new
books page dynamically from the db. Much shorter & neater.
It looks to me like the best solution for the edit page is close to what
Yuri suggests.
Since the edit page is very similar to the insert new books page, I
merely need to populate the Select options box slightly differently.
This is the code to populate the insert page:
<select name="categoriesIN[]" multiple size="8">
<?php
$sql = "SELECT * FROM categories"; 
  if ( ( $results = mysql_query($sql, $db) ) !== false ) {
        while ( $row = mysql_fetch_assoc($results) ) {
            echo "<option value=", $row['id'], ">", $row['category'],
"</option><br />";
            }
        }
?>
</select>

The problem nowis to find a way to add a conditional clause above that
will insert the option="selected" in the output.
The input for this comes from:
// do categories
$sql = "SELECT id, category FROM categories, book_categories
        WHERE book_categories.bookID = $idIN &&
book_categories.categories_id = categories.id";;
    if ( ( $results = mysql_query($sql, $db) ) !== false ) {
        while ( $row = mysql_fetch_assoc($results) ) {
            echo$row['id'], "<br />";
        }
    }

This may return any number of category ids so the problem is to figure
out a way to pass the ids from the above code to the right ids in the
first code above.
How & what do I search to match the two ids?

-- 
Hervé Kempf: "Pour sauver la planète, sortez du capitalisme."
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