you are here --> home|programming|php|datatables|index.html

DataTables

The datatable function maintains (creates, destroys, modifies, etc) a flat-file database kept in the data directory.

The great power of this function is it's simplicity of use - the most basic method to create a fully functional database using this is to simply place the function file in your main directory, create a data directory with full write permissions, and then simply call the function from within a php file. Here, for example, is an extremely simple source-file:

<html><body>
<? include("datatable.functions.txt"); datatable("test1","name|address|phone number"); ?>
</body></html>

This file can be seen in action here.

The above call creates a database that can be edited, appended, deleted, et cetera, by anyone. Note that the field names are separated by the symbol '|'.

The datatable() call has three parameters.

The first is the filename to read/write from/to (the data file)
The second is the field information so the table knows what to describe each piece of data as.
The third parameter gives you the option to allow or disallow edits. This parameter is optional - you don't need to place it in.

If you wanted to create something like a guestbook, you would not want people to go in and edit already entered data, so you could take out that ability by using the third parameter.

Currently understood Parameter 3 options

option	description	allowed values	default
add	allows new data to be entered	'yes','no'	'yes'
edit	allows existing data to be edited	'yes','no'	'yes'
delete	allows existing data to be deleted	'yes','no'	'yes'

If you merely wanted to display the data, and not allow other people to edit it, then you just turn off the editable options:

<html><body>
<? include("datatable.functions.txt"); datatable("test1","name|address|phone number","edit=no|add=no|delete=no"); ?>
</body></html>

An example of the above can be seen here.

The table as is is very plain. If you wanted to spruce it up a bit, you can change the Parameter 2 settings.

Each field mentioned in the parameter is defined as a group of strings separated by the '|' character.

To stick to the basics, you can use just about any character but the '|' and '=' characters. If no '=' is found, then the name of the field is the entire field string. As soon as you put a '=' in, though, you follow these rules:

Field strings can be broken down to more options. The options are delimited by the ',' character, and each option is a pair of words separated by a '='. The left word is the name of the option, and the right word is the value.

Currently understood Parameter 2 options

option	description	allowed values	default
name	The name allocated to the field. This is displayed to the reader, so make it obvious.	Anything, really	The entire field string
bgcolor	background color of the table cells of that field	any valid RGB color	none
textcolor	text color for the table cells	any valid RGB color	none

An example of the test database formatted with different colours is:

<html><body>
<?
 include("datatable.functions.txt");
 datatable("test1",
   "name=name,bgcolor=#000000,textcolor=#FFFF00|name=address,bgcolor=#808080|phone number",
   "edit=no|add=no|delete=no");
?>
</body></html>

An example of the above can be found here.

..and an editable example of the above can be found here.

Updates

2001/Nov/25

I added another Parameter 2 option - "type", which says whether a field is "text", "url", or "email", which affects how data is seen in non-edit mode. If it's "text", it prints out as normal. If it's "url", an HREF element is built up to point to that URL. If it's "email", another HREF is built, this time with "mailto:" prepended to the address. This added functionality does not check for errors (people not putting full HTTP addresses, for example) - if this is a problem, please mail me and I'll get down on my lazy butt and do it.

Please send any comments about these pages to kverens@contactjuggling.org