Adding Database Tables
By Paul
06/21/08 (Edited 09/06/12)
Suppose you want to add a new table of data into WSN. For purposes of illustration, we'll say it's a list of widgets. You want to be able to display a list of widgits with a toplist and {WIDGETFIELDNAME} template variables, and you (perhaps) want to allow users to submit, edit and delete widgets through WSN. If so, read on. First, create your database table using phpmyadmin or whatever method you prefer. Use the same prefix for it that you use for the rest of the tables in that installation -- we'll say wsnlinks_widgets for our example. Please follow these guidelines in making your table: (1) The first column should be named 'id' and be an integer with a 'unique' index set to auto_incriment (2) If you want to record the time the widget is added, include an integer field 'time' (3) If you want to record the time last edited, include an integer field named 'lastedit' (4) If it'll belong to a category, include an integer field named catid (5) If it'll belong to a member, include an integer field name ownerid After you've created the table, visit run yourinstalllocation/upgrade.php to get the table list cache updated (this step is necessary since 7.1.0). Then check the toplist generator and you'll find widgets available once you create the table. You'll use the template variables {WIDGETFIELDNAME} -- { + capitalized version of the table name with the prefix and any trailing 's' removed + capitalized version of any database field name + }. Displaying stuff isn't much use until we can create stuff, though... in our example we want to be able to create and delete widgets through the script, as well as possibly add other template functions. In order to enable these possibilities we need to create a widget class. Take the existing classes/search.php for a simple example. Copy that to widget.php, open it in a text editor. Change both instances of "search" to "widget" and change "searchestable" to "widgetstable" (this must be the name of your database table without the prefix, with the 'table' suffix). Note that as in our example the class name must be same as the file name (without the .php). Now that we have a class, we can create templates for adding and editing widgets. Our 'add widget' page will use a custom template named widget_add (that's what you can type on the manage templates page to create it) a.k.a. templates/yourset/custom/widget_add.tpl (if you prefer the filesystem). It will always be the name of the class followed by an underscore and an action type. The three available actions are add, view and edit: widget_add, widget_view, widget_edit templates. Our widget_add template needs to contain somewhere in it a form like this: Replace "widget" in the above with your applicable class and {WIDGET with your appropriate template variable prefix. Replace field1 and field2 with the names of fields in your database table, and add as many more as are applicable for you. Of course, if applicable for the field type, use selectors or checkboxes or radio buttons or textareas. In order to let people submit their widgets, we'll put a link somewhere to generics.php?action=add&classname=widget . For displaying a list of widgets, of course, you'll use a toplist. The toplist can link to a 'view individual widget' page (widget_view) like this: generics.php?action=view&classname=widget&id={WIDGETID} F or editing widgets, you'll link to generics.php?action=edit&classname=widget&id={WIDGETID} . The widget_edit template's form will be the same except for the opening
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