[FX.php List] Conditional value lists with PHP and FileMaker

[Gjermund Gusland Thorsen]

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ggt667

2008/11/19 Anders Monsen <andersm at alamark.com>:
> Has anyone on the list worked on this issue? I spent most of yesterday
> putting together a process that works, but may not be the most efficient
> process. I was wondering if anyone would be open to looking at my code (the
> snippet is 130 lines long at minimum, so I didn't just want to throw it out
> there) to see if there are ways I can improve the process. It certainly made
> me appreciate how easy FileMaker makes this process...
>
> (I just discovered and read Jonathan Stark's article in July
> FileMakerAdvisor after writing this email. It uses Ajax, so I may try to
> incorporate his techniques, although I'm using FX.php and no existing value
> lists from FileMaker, just existing data.)
>
> Here's the scenario. I have a table with four fields: district number,
> district name, campus number, and campus name. I want the district and
> campus to be drop down menus, where the user sees the name but submits the
> number into another FileMaker database/table. Also, when the user selects a
> district, I need the value list of campuses to correspond just to their
> appropriate district.
>
> My first issue was to find a way to create an associative array with
> district numbers=>district names. Apparently I took the hard route in
> dynamically building associative arrays... After several failed attempts, I
> used a function that I found on php.net in the section on "array_push" to
> create this array. The first problem I ran into was that the list currently
> contains 270 records. For now I had to manually change the groupsize in the
> query to above 300, but I plan to first query all records to get a count,
> then make this the groupsize. The reason for this is that the district array
> becomes unique only after all records have been loaded into the array, so
> the default groupsize of 50 has to be modified.
>
> Is there a way to 1) build a better array and 2) make the district array
> unique in the initial query? The database is structured as one file, with
> all four fields, and so the district numbers and names are repeated. I
> didn't create the database, and I can't change it.
> Distnum |       Distname        | CampusNum     |       Campus Name
> 10                      The ISD         2                       School
> 10                      The ISD         2.1                     OtherSchool
> etc.
>
> Additionally, after several failed attempts to get the Javascript onchange
> function to work when the form changed, I resorted to DreamWeaver's
> JumpMenu, which seems to work fine. Has anyone been able to get a working
> onchange form and what is the correct syntax? When the user selects a
> district from the dropdown, the page reloads with the district number in the
> URL.
>
> Given all of the above, my process *does* work, and the page does not appear
> to load with delays. I have not used conditional values lists with
> PHP/Javascript in about three years, so I am a little unsure of best
> practices.
>
> Thanks,
> Anders
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