a script that picks a random file...

[johnny5]

anyone know where i can get a script that will pick a random html file from a folder on my server once a day for a "story of the day"?
any help is greatly appreciated, thanks!

[cezam]

index those files into a sql table, and use query like this:

SELECT * FROM table_name ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 0,1

it's really easy in php

[johnny5]

so if i index the files... the only thing i put in a php file is
SELECT * FROM table_name ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 0,1
and when i call that file it will return a random file and open it in a browser?

[cezam]

Originally posted by johnny5
so if i index the files... the only thing i put in a php file is
SELECT * FROM table_name ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 0,1
and when i call that file it will return a random file and open it in a browser?

no.. take a look at mysql_connect() and mysql_query() commands and learn how to use them. it will look like this:

this is the sql table:

<PRE>
id | name
---------------
1 | story1.html
2 | story2.html
...
</PRE>

this is a sample php file:

<PRE>
&lt;?
$db = mysql_connect("localhost", "user", "password");
$res = mysql_query("SELECT name FROM table ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 0,1");
$row = mysql_fetch_array($res, MYSQL_ASSOC));
mysql_free_result($res);
mysql_close($db);
?&gt;

this is a link to a &lt;a href="&lt;?=$row["name"]?&gt;">random story&lt;/a&gt;
</PRE>

check out the php manual at www.php.net/manual

[jeffs]

function randompage($folder){
	$or = opendir($folder);
	$htmls = array();
	while($file = readdir($or)){
		if(ereg(".+\.html$") || ereg(".+\.htm$")) $htmls[] = $file;
	}
	$rint = mt_rand(0, count($htmls)-1);
	return $htmls[$rint];
}
//replace "/storieS" with the path to your stories dirctory
echo randompage("/stories") ;

sorry if there are errors, i didnt test it. you'll need to do the HTML yourself; the board is crapping it up.

[SpaceAce]

Originally posted by johnny5
anyone know where i can get a script that will pick a random html file from a folder on my server once a day for a "story of the day"?
any help is greatly appreciated, thanks!

What should it do with the file? Copy it somehwere? Insert it's name somewhere? What you want is really simple and doesn't require an SQL database as long as you don't have 20,000 stories in the directory you want the script to pick from.

SpaceAce

[johnny5]

Originally posted by SpaceAce


What should it do with the file? Copy it somehwere? Insert it's name somewhere? What you want is really simple and doesn't require an SQL database as long as you don't have 20,000 stories in the directory you want the script to pick from.

SpaceAce

i just want it to pick a random html file and display it for the surfer to read...

[johnny5]

Originally posted by jeffs

function randompage($folder){
	$or = opendir($folder);
	$htmls = array();
	while($file = readdir($or)){
		if(ereg(".+\.html$") || ereg(".+\.htm$")) $htmls[] = $file;
	}
	$rint = mt_rand(0, count($htmls)-1);
	return $htmls[$rint];
}
//replace "/storieS" with the path to your stories dirctory
echo randompage("/stories") ;

sorry if there are errors, i didnt test it. you'll need to do the HTML yourself; the board is crapping it up.

imma give this a shot, thanks man looks like it will work.. thanks to all of you :]

[Commrade_ICQ]

I wantski programski like this.

I wantski to run 'ICQski Luck DipSki'

Person send me cash via carrier pigeon forski number and program pick themski random one.

Canski this be doneski?

[johnny5]

didnt work...lol