HELP! Drop down menu loaded from database

jacare

i'm going doing a property site as a summer project for a client. It would be something like http://www.property.ie/.

However i need to know how can you create a drop down menu loaded from
a database. it would also be helpful if someone could also explain how to display info from a database into a HTML table.

if you can, could someone recommend a website or book.

i would be using apache, php, mysql

Creamy Goodness

you would do something like this.

select item from table group by item;

then start your select drop down list.
while loop while there are results from the sql statement to display the options
when the while loop finishes, end your select drop down list.

forbairt

http://devzone.zend.com/public/view/tag/tutorials will have a load of tutorials ...

Whats your programming background if any ?

Really it sounds like you are a complete beginner ... as such I'd recommend a book similar to http://www.amazon.com/Web-Database-Applications-PHP-MySQL/dp/0596005431/ref=pd_sim_b_img_5

democrates

Also PHP and MYSQL Web Development gives a fair intro.

A barebones example from a quick google :
[PHP]
$connection = mysql_connect("localhost","user","pass");
$fields = mysql_list_fields("dbname", "table", $connection);
$columns = mysql_num_fields($fields);
echo "<form action=page_to_post_to.php method=POST><select name=Field>";
for ($i = 0; $i < $columns; $i++) {
echo "<option value=$i>";
echo mysql_field_name($fields, $i);
}
echo "</select></form>";
[/PHP]Then you'll probably want to use a session variable to track the selected value and use selected="selected" in the option tag.

Also google for examples of cleansing user input, treat it as toxic by default otherwise you open the application to sql injection attacks.

jacare

thanks alot guys.