How to make reference to one of my MySQL databases inside my PHP file?

Question

I have already asked this related question: https://webmasters.stackexchange.com/questions/116055/using-mysql-database-data-directly-into-generating-articles-for-my-website-new/116056?noredirect=1#comment154341_116056

At this point, I'm starting to understand the code syntax and project structure a little better.

But I have made my database using MySQL console. it only has a few entries so far, I wanted to try to adapt the code in Zach's example, but here is the problem I have:

The problem is, I am unsure how to get the reference to my database object? In the code sample from Zach there is variable $db, I guess this is where i need to keep a reference to my own actual database.

Here is the psuedo-code (maybe) from Zach, note: he always said to me not to copy-paste it, but I'm just trying to see how I can use it in my project.

<?php

$SQL_Query = "SELECT * FROM your_table";
$SQL_Run = mysqli_query($db, $SQL_Query);

while ($row = mysqli_fetch_assoc($SQL_Run)) {
echo 
"<section class='wrapper style1'>
<div class='inner'>
<header class='align-center'>
<h2>" . $row['imageurl'] . "</h2>
<img src='" . $row['title'] . "'> 
<p>" . $row['description'] . "</p>
</header>
</div>
</section>";
}

?>

So my question simply at moment is: How to create the reference $db?

Zach Voss · Accepted Answer · 2018-06-26 18:01:59Z

2

Your answer is the correct way to establish a connection. I want to point out that there are two ways of writing that statement. The version you found online is one way, but from our previous conversation, you can write it like this:

<?php

// Establish how to log in
$servername = "127.0.0.1";
$username = "root";
$password = "yourpasswordhere";
$dbname = "yourdatabasenamehere";

// create the database connection
$db = new mysqli($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);

// if it fails, kill the site.
if (mysqli_connect_error($db)) {
    die("Connection failed: " . mysqli_connect_error($db));
}

// your first query to grab all the article data
$SQL_Query = "SELECT * FROM your_table";
// run the query
$SQL_Run = mysqli_query($db, $SQL_Query);

// while data exists (it makes sure that you have post data, otherwise nothing shows up)
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_assoc($SQL_Run)) {
    echo 
    "<section class='wrapper style1'>
    <div class='inner'>
        <header class='align-center'>
            <h2>" . $row['imageurl'] . "</h2>
            <img src='" . $row['title'] . "'> 
            <p>" . $row['description'] . "</p>
        </header>
    </div>
</section>";
}

// Close the connection
mysqli_close($db);
?>

You will notice that the connections are written like a function.

mysqli_num_rows($result);

instead of

$result->num_rows

Both do the same thing, just a personal preference. That should hopefully clear some things up from your first post :)

edited Jun 26, 2018 at 18:01

answered Jun 26, 2018 at 17:52

Zach Voss

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1 Comment

Big T Larrity Over a year ago

thanks Zach. I actually got it working over night :D I also learned I can use the SELECT call to sort them by genre and order then ascending / descending etc by ID or date etc. I'll post my code to the bottom of my answer for further help for future readers (and/or probably for me next time i need to do it haha!) thanks again for the massive help pal you saved me hours of trial n error i think. cheers

halfer · Accepted Answer · 2019-12-15 22:32:10Z

I have got further on and I think have answered my own question. I found it a bit tricky to research because I don't understand all the different terms and names of features/api/scripts/etc. But I had just to read the documentation for mysqli_connect(), I set up the code as follows and now I have pulled all the data from the database into words on my html/php files.

From here I think I can rewrite the code to first sort it by date and then can of course put the latest posts at the top of each page etc.

I can also allow the user to click 'Genre' and only view Comedy for example.

Here is the code just to get the data parsed into my index.php file:

<?php
$servername = "127.0.0.1";
$username = "root";
$password = "yourpasswordhere";
$dbname = "yourdatabasenamehere";

// Create connection
$conn = new mysqli($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);
// Check connection
if ($conn->connect_error) {
    die("Connection failed: " . $conn->connect_error);
}

$sql = "SELECT id, type, title FROM releases";
$result = $conn->query($sql);

if ($result->num_rows > 0) {
    // output data of each row
    while($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
        echo "id: " . $row["id"]. " - Type: " . $row["type"]. " - Title " .         $row["title"]. "<br>";
    }   
} else {
    echo "0 results";
}
$conn->close();
?>

I extended upon the above work by making the php script fetch all the entries in the database and create the previous html article I had once for each entry. In the SELECT statement I can control which types of entries are displayed (eg. For a certain category). Here was how I did it:

  // make an html article based snippet (image, title, description, etc),
  //once for each entry in the database table...
 <?php
$servername = "127.0.0.1";
$username = "root";
$password = "somepassword";
$dbname = "somedatabasename";

// create connection
$conn = new mysqli($servername, $username, $password, $dbname);
// check connection
if ($conn->connect_error) {
die("connection failed: " . $conn->connect_error);
}

$sql = "SELECT * FROM releases ORDER BY id DESC";
$result = $conn->query($sql);


if ($result->num_rows > 0) 
{
// output data of each row
while($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) 
{
echo '<section class="wrapper style1">';
echo '<div class="inner">';
echo '<header class="align-center">';
echo '<h2>'. $row["title"] . '</h2>';
echo '<div class="image fit">';
echo '<img src='. $row["imgurl"] .'>'; 
echo '</div> <p> RELEASE TITLE: ' . $row["title"] . '<br /> DATE POSTED: ' . $row["postdate"] . '<br /> DESCRIPTION: ' . $row["description"] . '</p>';
echo '<a href="'.$row["link"].'">DOWNLOAD LINK: '.$row["link"].'</a> <br />';
$NfoLink = $row["nfolink"];
if ($NfoLink != 'not found' && $NfoLink != '')
{   
    echo '<a href="'.$row["nfolink"].'">NFO LINK/MORE DOWNLOADS: '.$row["nfolink"].'</a>';
}
echo '</header>';
echo '</div>';
echo '</section>';
}
} 
else 
{
echo "0 results";
}
$conn->close();
?>

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