Hello Folks,

For years I have been using mySQL/php as the basis for creating dynamic
content in web sites. For years I have worked with clumsy, long and
convoluted SQL queries while muttering under my breath 'I sure wish I
could ues PICK for this!'

Well now I can and in experimenting it seems to work very well. Hurray!
No more 'select populations from india upper join pakistan on india.id
= pakistan.mutual_hatred outer join mongolia on ...' LOL

After posting the little dictionary exercize the other day, Glen
suggested using it for a FAQ. It is up and running (although stil a
work in progress):
http://12.168.68.42/faq/

If you would like the source for this please contact me at tomd at
blackflute dot com with a meaningful subject. Included in this source
are things like user authentication, http session management and the
obvious AJAX stuff ... all using openQM as the backend.

Many thanks to:
Dave Walker, Andy Pflueger and Kevin Ruland for making SWIG+php work.

Jon Sisk for letting me use his CDP FAQ to seed the database (I hope to
be able to put it all in there before too long).

Comments, complaints and bug alerts welcomed.
-Tom

I think there is some kind of problem: entering "*" or a keyword gets
me a list of links, but none of them work. In IE I get "javascript
error"; in Firefox, nothing.

Scott Ballinger
Pareto Corporation
Edmonds WA USA
206 713 6006

Scott Ballinger wrote:
Same problem with Firefox here, but in IE I get to see the topic.
Trouble is, the topic is overlaid on the "Enter Key Word ('*' to list
all)" text.

Luke

Luke Webber wrote:
The links work as well. Very interesting stuff.

Patrick <;=)

Hi Scott,

Thanks for taking the time. What version of Windows and IE are you
using? I am unable to reproduce this. Everything works as expected when
I test with:

Win2K / IE5
Win2K / Firefox
Win2K / Netscape7
WinXP / IE6
WinXP / Firefox
WinXP / Netscape7
Debian Stable / Firefox
Debian Stable / Mozilla5
Debian Stable / Epiphany1.4.8
Debian Stable / Galeon1.3.20
Debian Stable / Konqueror3.2.2

I haven't tried IE/Wine but ... well, I probably won't LOL Don't have a
MAC so can't try Safari but have found that usually if Konqueror works,
so does Safari.

I appreciate the input! Error messages would be a big help, does Microsoft
provide a javaScript console?
-Tom

Hi Luke,

It is interesting that Firefox doesn't work because that is my main
browser, the one I have always used for development. I don't have a
Windoze box here so can't re-check but will in the morning.

Can you pop open the javascript console and share the contents?

Yes, I neglected to set a width so with smaller resolutions/large fonts
you will have that, will fix this in the morning as well.

Thanks!
-Tom

Hi Patrick,

Stopped in before hitting the sack ... thanks for that hint! ('Try
entering a single letter') Indeed when the <Enter> key was pressed in
Firefox the form would be submitted. Long ago I (should have) learned
that the fellow who wrote the stuff *shouldn't* be the fellow who does
the beta testing ... he knows too well how to use it <g>

I have effected an ugly but I think effective fix for this. Will look
at it in the morning for a more 'proper' repair.

Thanks again,
-Tom

IE 5.5+ on XP+SP2.

Full keyword entry does nothing, single character works, but what does it
mean? "L" for instance, returns Pick on Unix and Native Open, "A" returns
CDP Common Answer and Pick on Unix...what's the connection?

After a few entries which work, I consistently get:
Unable to read item 'Test_formatting' Error: '2'
Yes, there is a IE/Windows javascript debugger/console, but this appears to
be a php or object error, so that's no help.

Aside: Curiosity killed the cat. Looking at the source, I note this:
eval('document.all.' + name);

eval calls the jscript compiler internally to evaluate the expression. On
most pages it does not matter a whit, but if you are doing any extensive
programming in javascript, this is horrendously expensive. In our Webapp,
our multi-value display was changed from using evals extensively to more
rational code, and there was an 90% increase in speed, translating to a drop
from 2 seconds to 0.2 for, say, 100-line displays (Maybe this says we
shouldn't be using javascript!)

And, in almost all cases, it is unnecessary; the above could be (syntax
which also works on NS)
document.all[ name ];

Besides, why wouldn't document.getElementById(name); work on all browsers?

Finally, "name" is a semi-reserved word in javascript; if scope is not
correctly setup, it references window.name, and if you change that, it leads
to curious and difficult-to-debug errors down the road. Been there, done
that.

Chandru Murthi

"Tom deL" <ted (AT) blackflute (DOT) com> wrote

Hi Murthi,

Thank you for taking the time to look.

None ... but thanks for the help there. The point was really the php
openQM module and I probably shouldn't have muddied the waters with the
stupid computer tricks ;-)

The database is very small and experimental right now and I had
originally simply stuck some keywords into the index. Since you pointed
out that it is pretty meaningless this way I have re-indexed the
keywords to include the title of the item.

In the plans (if this goes beyond 'playing with the toys') is a search
function that will search the body of the FAQ for text, weighting
results by number of hits, doo-dah, doo-dah ...

Ah, you apparently clicked on a 'See Also' entry that was orphaned in
testing the delete function (which now correctly removes the
SeeAlso's). I have manually removed those.

And I am not (extensively programming in JS). This is a simple example
script.

For years I have avoided doing much beyond the 'necessary evil' in JS
due to the stupidity of the browser wars, just too much work and too
flaky for my needs. Unfortunately old JS concepts and techniques are
still with me.

Possibly. Have you considered the visitor trust implications of basing
an application on remote scripting? Lots of fear mongering going on out
there regarding this technology.

It likely would. Again, the point here wasn't javaScript but thanks for
the tips.
-Tom

Scott:

I don't have that problem with Firefox. [phew!] It actually works on IE
(the backspace key is your friend here, I think).

Bill

"Scott Ballinger" <scott.ballinger (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote