Question

I’m new to PHP, mysql etc. I’ve done some work in VB and Java, and am reasonably fluent in html.

I’m trying to set up a PHP webpage that looks up train times from a schedule that follows the form:

---------------------------------------------------------
| runId | stop1 | stop2 | stop3 | stop4 | stop5 | stop6 |
---------------------------------------------------------
|   1   |  5:00 |  5:10 |  5:21 | 5:34  | 5:40  | 6:00  |
---------------------------------------------------------
|   2   |  5:30 |  5:40 |  5:51 | 6:04  | 6:10  | 6:30  |
---------------------------------------------------------
|   3   |  6:00 |  6:10 |  6:21 | 6:34  | 6:40  | 7:00  |
---------------------------------------------------------

I then want to query the table knowing the current time and the stop number (column title) for the two entries that occur after the present time. So for example if I was at stop3 and it was 5:00 I would want the query to return $time[1]=5:21, $time[2]=5:51 but I would not want any more results to be returned (e.g. there should be no $time[3] = 6:21 set).

Any help would be greatly appreciated, this is a relatively small project, if it makes any difference to how you would recommend setting up the table.

Answer 1

The table should be like this:

runId stop time
   1    1  5:00
   1    2  5:10
   1    3  5:21
   ...
   2    1  5:30
   2    2  5:40
   ...

create table schedule (runId int, stop int, `time` time);
insert into schedule (runId, stop, `time`) values
(1,1,'05:00'),
(1,2,'05:10'),
(1,3,'05:21'),
(1,4,'05:34'),
(1,5,'05:40'),
(1,6,'06:00'),
(2,1,'05:30'),
(2,2,'05:40'),
(2,3,'05:51'),
(2,4,'06:04'),
(2,5,'06:10'),
(2,6,'06:30'),
(3,1,'06:00'),
(3,2,'06:10'),
(3,3,'06:21'),
(3,4,'06:34'),
(3,5,'06:40'),
(3,6,'07:00')
;

And the query:

sql = "
    select runId, stop, `time`
    from schedule
    where stop = $stop and `time` > current_time
    limit 2
    ;
";