Displaying Reminders page from MySQL Database - php

Question

I've created a PHP program for adding and viewing reminders. The add page works, but I'm having some trouble displaying them properly. How should I code this to only get the actual data? Also, how could I put this into an HTML table? (i.e. column for name, description, and date; rows are the retrieved data)
Thanks
When I open the file in my browser I get this as an output:
Array ( [reminderID] => 14 [reminderName] => Test [reminderDescript] => Test_Descript [reminderDate] => 2012 05 7 )
Code:
<?php include 'header.php'; ?>
<?php include 'database.php'; ?>
<div id="content">
<h1>Reminder List</h1>
<table align ="center">
<thead>
<tr>
<td>Name</td>
<td>Description</td>
<td>Date</td>
</tr>
</thead>
<?php
$query = 'SELECT * FROM reminder_event';
$result = mysql_query($query);
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
print_r($row);
}
?>
</table>
<p><a href='reminder_add.php'>Add Reminder</a></p>
</div>
<?php include 'footer.php'; ?>

Answer 1

print_r() is a diagnostic tool for debugging, not to be used for real output. Instead, output HTML to a table using the array keys fetched from your row.
// Open a table
echo "<table>";
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
// Output each row
echo "<tr>
<td>{$row['reminderName']}</td>
<td>{$row['reminderDescript']}</td>
<td>{$row['reminderDate']}</td>
</tr>";
}
// Close the table
echo "</table>";
Better still, escape each of the values for HTML output with [htmlspecialchars()] (http://us3.php.net/manual/en/function.htmlspecialchars.php) before output to prevent cross-site scripting attacks and broken HTML if characters like < > & are encountered in the values.
echo "<table>";
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
// Encode all values for HTML output
$name = htmlspecialchars($row['reminderName']);
$desc = htmlspecialchars($row['reminderDescript']);
$date = htmlspecialchars($row['reminderDate']);
// Then output the encoded values
echo "<tr><td>$name</td><td>$desc</td><td>$date</td></tr>";
}
echo "</table>";

Answer 2

Change:
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
print_r($row);
}
To:
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
echo $row['reminderID'];
echo $row['reminderName'];
echo $row['reminderDescript'];
echo $row['reminderDate'];
}
You can echo those values out in whatever HTML you'd like. So, for example, if you want it in a table you would do something like this:
echo "<table><tr>";
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) {
echo "<td>" . $row['reminderID'] . "</td>";
echo "<td>" . $row['reminderName'] . "</td>";
echo "<td>" . $row['reminderDescript'] . "</td>";
echo "<td>" . $row['reminderDate'] . "</td>";
}
echo "</tr></table>";
You can clean that up a bit to take some (or all) of the HTML out of the PHP.

Answer 3

<?php include 'header.php'; ?>
<?php include 'database.php'; ?>
<div id="content">
<h1>Reminder List</h1>
<table>
<thead><tr><td>id</td><td>name</td><td>description</td><td>date</td></tr></thead>
<tbody>
<?php
$query = 'SELECT * FROM reminder_event';
$result = mysql_query($query);
while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($result)) { ?>
<tr>
<td><?php echo $row['reminderID']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $row['reminderName']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $row['reminderDescript']; ?></td>
<td><?php echo $row['reminderDate']; ?></td>
</tr>
<?php } ?>
</tbody>
</table>
<p><a href='reminder_add.php'>Add Reminder</a></p>
</div>
<?php include 'footer.php'; ?>