Populating drop down boxes in php - php

Question

just a quick one im looking to populate three drop down boxes to filter data and each one of them is going to affect the next.
what i want is for
Drop down 1 has company
once drop down 1 is selected the second drop down is populated with the branches for that company
once selected the third drop down is populated by the staff members for that company in that branch then when i press search it should pull the data for that 1 staff member. all of the information is in one table
the table i have is called "stafflist"
the columns are "company", "branch" and "staffname" each staff member has an autonumber id field which i use as a lookup called "staffID"
Thank you for any help
Regards
Slowie

Answer 1

Lets take an easy example, This is a javascript solution. I'm using this and it works perfectly fine. This script work in case if you select a country it populates its corresponding cities in the second dropdown. You can take some idea and use this for your case where you can deal with three dropdowns respectively.
This is the country dropdown:
<?php
$countrylist=mysql_query("SELECT * FROM country ORDER BY name ASC");
echo "<select name='country' id='country' onchange=\"reload(this.form)\" title='Country e:g; United Kingdom,Pakistan'><option value='0'>Select Country</option>";
while($clist=mysql_fetch_array($countrylist))
{
echo "<option value='$clist[Name]'>$clist[Name]</option>"."<br/>";
}
echo "</select>";
?>
This is the region dropdown:
<select name="region" id="region" ></select>
Now make a seperate file named crlist.js and include it in the page having above code like this:
<script type="text/javascript" src="crlist.js"> </script>
code for crlist.js:
var request = false;
/*#cc_on #*/
/*#if (#_jscript_version >= 5)
try {
request = new ActiveXObject("Msxml2.XMLHTTP");
} catch (e) {
try {
request = new ActiveXObject("Microsoft.XMLHTTP");
} catch (e2) {
request = false;
}
}
#end #*/
function fillSelect(country,path) {
var url = path+"crlist.php?country=" + country;
request.open("GET", url, true);
request.onreadystatechange = go;
request.send(null);
}
function go() {
if (request.readyState == 4) {
//if (request.status == 200) {
var response = request.responseText;
var list=document.getElementById("region");
for (i = list.length - 1; i>=0; i--) {
list.remove(i);
}
var records=response.split('|');
for (i=1; i<records.length; i++) {
//alert("rcord="+records[i]);
var record=records[i].split('*');
var region=record[0];
//alert("region="+region);
var regionid=record[1];
//alert("regionid="+regionid);
var x=document.createElement('option');
//var y=document.createTextNode(region);
x.text=region;
//x.value=region;
//alert(x.text);
//x.appendChild(y);
//list.appendChild(x);
list.options.add(x);
}
//}
}
}
function initCs(path) {
if (!request && typeof XMLHttpRequest != 'undefined') {
request = new XMLHttpRequest();
}
var country=document.getElementById('country');
country.onchange=function() {
if(this.value!="Select") {
var list=document.getElementById("region");
for (i = list.length - 1; i>=0; i--) {
list.remove(i);
}
//while (list.childNodes[0]) {
//list.removeChild(list.childNodes[0]);
//}
}
fillSelect(this.value,path);
//alert(this.value);
}
//fillSelect(country.value);
}
Now make a seperate file named crlist.php.
Code for crlist.php:
<?php
require_once 'yourconfigfile.php';
$cname = $_GET['country'];
$query="select ID,Name from city where CountryCode=(select code from country where name='$cname') Order By Name ASC";
$res = mysql_query($query) or die(mysql_error());
while($region = mysql_fetch_array($res)){
echo "<option value='".$region['Name']."'>".$region['Name']."</option>";
}
?>
Now add following script on the page having dropdowns:
<script type="text/javascript" src="crlist.js"> </script>
<script>
$(document).ready(function() {
initCs("");
});
</script>
This is my own script, and i've assumed that you have created country and region tables. But you need to tweak the queries and above code according to your db structure. In your case you have to create tables for company, branches and employees.
Hope this helps.

Answer 2

Have you ever heard about AJAX() OR jQuery ? if not then refer those link first; actually for your task you need to use Ajax OR jquery based dropdown boxes. which can make your dream success. :)
refer below link for your solution.
If any help needed you can feel free to ask me..
EDIT As per your commnet :
Step-1:- "SELECT company_id,company_name from company_table WHERE $condition ";
Step-2:- Fill first drop down box with record of first query set.
Step-3:- call jquery.ajax function onchange event of first drop down box in which call one
php page i.e: getRecords.php.
Step-4:- In getRecords.php page you need to get all the Branches of that company by passing company id in ajax and return a record array as response.
Step-5:- Fill second drop down with these records and again onchange event call another jquery.ajax request for final drop down box and do all things same as Step-4.
I think its all steps what you need for. still have any issue let me inform.
Thanks.