Question

I need to create an unordered list of dates for a news items archive… It should look like this

2011
    Dec
    Nov
    etc..
2010
    Dec
    Nov
    etc...
Older

Here is what I have so far..

    Dim StartYear As DateFormat = Date.Now.Year
    Dim EndYear As DateFormat = Date.Now.Year - 2

    ltlArchives.Text = "<ul id=""ArchivesYears"">"
    For StartYear = StartYear To EndYear Step -1
        ltlArchives.Text = ltlArchives.Text + "<li>" + StartYear.ToString + "</li>"
    Next
    ltlArchives.Text = ltlArchives.Text + "<li>Other</li>"
    ltlArchives.Text = ltlArchives.Text + "</ul>"

I can carry on with this adding in the for loops for months nested under each year however it doesn’t seem very practical and will generate links for months even if there are no news item entries…

Is there a way I can build this tree automatically and only include the years/months that have news entries. I can pull a list of SQL Server timestamps from the DB for all the news items and then would like to populate the list based on that…

Can someone point me in the right direction?

Answer 1

You need to find out years and months with news item from SQL Server – say using distinct query. For example, assuming PostedDate column indicates entry date for new item

SELECT DISTINCT
   datepart(year, n.PostedDate) as Year,
   datepart(month, n.PostedDate) as Month,
FROM
   dbo.NewsItem n
ORDER BY
   Year desc, Month desc

This query will give you years and months that have news items. Now bind it with say repeater control to get what you want.