Question

I’m pretty new to PHP, so please forgive me if this question is obnoxiously noob…

I have a page that lists close to 150 records from a database. I want the user to only be able to delete one record at a time (no checkboxes). I want there to be a delete button next to each name, and when the user clicks it, the page refreshes with the updated list and success message above saying: “%Name% was deleted successfully”. (where %Name% is the actual name they deleted)

My question is: Can I do this with a form? If so, what form element would I assign the Name and delete button to?

Or, do I need to set the delete button as an anchor element, with the URL set to a page that can process the delete request, then redirects the user back (my concern there is the only way I can send the “Success” message back, that I know of is through a Session variable, is that ok?)

Or, is there some other way completely that I don’t know of?

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks

Answer 1

you can do it both way… here the key concept is having a unique field like id in the database for eg you have id,name,username and password field in database table so look at both the ways below

1. using hyperlink

<?php
mysql_connect("fostname","username","password");
mysql_select_db("database_name");
$q = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM tbl_name");
if(mysql_num_rows($q)>0)
{
echo"<table>";
echo "<tr><td>name</td><td>action</td></tr>";
while($name = mysql_fetch_assoc($q))
{
?>

<tr><td><?php echo $name['name'];?></td><td><a href="delete.php?id=<?php echo $name['id'];?>">Delete</a></td></tr>
<?php
}

echo "</table>";
}
?>

this is what you do in listing page…. now look at delete.php which needs to be on the path as defined in hyperlink

delete.php

<?php
mysql_connect("fostname","username","password");
mysql_select_db("database_name");
$id = $_GET['id'];
$q = mysql_query("delete from tbl_name where id = '$id'");
header("Location: list.php");
?>

2. Using form

<?php
    mysql_connect("fostname","username","password");
    mysql_select_db("database_name");
    $q = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM tbl_name");
    if(mysql_num_rows($q)>0)
    {
    echo"<table>";
    echo "<tr><td>name</td><td>action</td></tr>";
    while($name = mysql_fetch_assoc($q))
    {
    ?>

    <tr><td><?php echo $name['name'];?></td><td><form action='delete.php' method='post'> <input type='hidden' value='<?php echo $name["id"];?>'></form></td></tr>
    <?php
    }

    echo "</table>";
    }
    ?>

delete.php

<?php
    mysql_connect("fostname","username","password");
    mysql_select_db("database_name");
    $id = $_POSTs['id'];
    $q = mysql_query("delete from tbl_name where id = '$id'");
    header("Location: list.php");
    ?>

(note: list.php is the page where you list all the info)