Alfabetic list with index view - php

Question

I want to make an alfabetic list of teams.
A
A.....
A..... A.....
B
B.....
B.....
C
C.....
C.....
C.....
Now I do it on this way, what means if there is no team beginning with an A I has to remove the code. Can you tell me who I have to do it?
$conn=mysqli_connect(DB_HOST, DB_USERNAME, DB_PASSWORD, DB_SCHEMA_NAME);
/* check connection */
if (mysqli_connect_errno()) {
printf("Connect failed: %s\n", mysqli_connect_error());
exit();
}
$sql="SELECT * FROM teams where active=1 AND l_teamname='A' ORDER BY f_teamname asc";
echo "<table id='adressen_table'><tr><td><b>A </b><hr></td></tr>";
if ($result = mysqli_query($conn, $sql)) {
/* fetch associative array */
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_row($result)) {
echo "<tr><td><a href=adr_det?teamid=$row[0]>$row[2]</a></td></tr>";
}
echo "</table>";
}
$sql="SELECT * FROM teams where active=1 AND l_teamname='B' ORDER BY f_teamname asc";
echo "<table id='adressen_table'><tr><td><b>B </b><hr></td></tr>";
if ($result = mysqli_query($conn, $sql)) {
/* fetch associative array */
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_row($result)) {
echo "<tr><td><a href=adr_det?teamid=$row[0]>$row[2]</a></td></tr>";
}
echo "</table>";
}

Answer 1

Considering your code is "correct" then you should just change it a bit to do it only once and not 26 times for the whole alphabet...
The code below is just one way to do it, there are probably (certainly!) more effective ways to do the job, without these if/else blocks I added. But this is a quick idea :
//Did not touch the first part of your code...
//But don't forget, to make it work "fine" you have to sort by 2nd column
//(name I guess) so the items are already alphabetic ordered. If you
//don't do that, you'll see undefined number of "A" arrays opened
//& so on...
//...
//...Here we go
//check if your query ran fine, AND if it returned at least one row
if (($result = mysqli_query($conn, $sql))&&($result->num_rows>0)) {
//declare a variable that will keep the last "first character" you found
$firstChar= '';
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_row($result)) {
//check if the last character you found is the same as actual
if($row[2][0] == $firstChar){
//if so, then just display your line
echo "<tr><td><a href=adr_det?teamid=$row[0]>$row[2]</a></td></tr>";
}else{
if($firstChar==''){
//if first character wasn't set yet, then you have to open the first table.
//A string is a char array, so $string[0] will return the first character of the string.
$firstChar= $row[2][0];
echo "<table id='adressen_table'><tr><td><b>".$firstChar." </b><hr></td></tr>";
echo "<tr><td><a href=adr_det?teamid=$row[0]>$row[2]</a></td></tr>";
}else{
//if first char was set but is not the same as the previous
//then you have to (update firstchar value and) close the actual table,
//open a new one, insert your row with your new 'firstchar' and insert the row you're fetching.
echo "</table>";
$firstChar = $row[2][0];
echo "<table id='adressen_table'><tr><td><b>".$firstChar." </b><hr></td></tr>";
echo "<tr><td><a href=adr_det?teamid=$row[0]>$row[2]</a></td></tr>";
}
}
}
//close last table you opened
echo "</table>";
}else{
//Your query failed or returned nothing
}
Hope it helps