Question

I need some help with some PHP and MySQL code. At the moment I have a php file which displays the contents of a table in my database. I would like it to omit results that match “Not Booked”. So the file only shows me slots which are booked. Here is my code:

<link href="../css/pagestyle.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
<?php 
include("../config.php");
include("functions.php");
if($logged["level"] == "HDJ" OR $logged["level"] == "SA") {

echo "<div class=\"head\">View Booked Slots</div>
<img src=\"../images/spacer.png\" width=\"5\" height=\"5\">
<div class=\"board\">Here you can view booked slots.</div>
<img src=\"../images/spacer.png\" width=\"5\" height=\"5\">
<table width=\"580px\" class=\"board\" border=\>";
      $order = "SELECT * FROM timetable";
      $result = mysql_query($order);
      while ($row=mysql_fetch_array($result)){
        echo ("<tr><td>$row[username]</td>");

        </tr>");
      }
      echo "
      </table>
"; 


    } else {
echo ("<div class=\"caution\">Access is denied.</div>");
}
?> 

Answer 1

Modify the query not to pull them in the first place.

$order = "SELECT * FROM timetable WHERE <the column> <> 'Not Booked';

Replace <the column> with the correct column name in your table where Not Booked appears.

It is often not advisable to intermix database logic and display logic as you have done here. Instead, you ought to do the query before outputting your table, and store its results in an array. Then loop over the array to display your table.

$order = "SELECT * FROM timetable WHERE somecolumn <> 'Not Booked'";
$result = mysql_query($order);

// Error checking
if (!$result) {
  // output error, take other action
}
else {
  while ($row=mysql_fetch_array($result)){
     // Append all results onto an array
     $rowset[] = $row;
  }
}

Later, loop over the array to output your values. Dont’ forget to escape it for HTML output with htmlspecialchars().

foreach ($rowset as $row) {
  echo "<tr><td>" . htmlspecialchars($row['username']) . "</td></tr>";
}