Software Database

[misterph]

I'm a newbie when it comes to PHP and MySQL, but i've managed so far just using my IF statements heh.

I'm a techy for a school and we currently log everything on paper with reguards to each workstation. We basically have a table on paper listing all the software packages and precedures for setting up workstations.

I'm wanting to make a website using PHP and MySQL which will list all the software and display what softwares installed when I click on the workstation name.

Now i have a few ideas as to prehaps i should go about it. For example... 2 tables,

1: Software
- ID
- Name

2: Computers
- ID
- ComputerName

(this is where i get stuck, do i just create about 30 new rows? e.g softwareID1, softwareID2 and make the values 1 or to indicate thats installed? or do i create the 30 odd new rows and put the corrisponding software id?...)

- softwareID1
- softwareID2
- etc etc

Also... I have not yet tired arrays, I was thinkin that prehaps if i had 1 field on the computers table for a long strong with software ID's seperated with a space then explode it and query each to find the software title?

I'm sure you guys are prehaps alot more confident at answering this as i was writing it. Please help me, im sure there's a more simple way.

Thanks for anyhelp, much apprecaited!

phil

[dptr1988]

What you need is a third table that contains the the computer ID and the software ID. I think it's called a Relational Database [a href=\"http://www.htmlgoodies.com/primers/database/article.php/3478051#setup\" target=\"_blank\"]HTML Goodies[/a] has a good beginners article about databases.

[misterph]

ok, yeh I suppose I could create a 3rd table with the workstationID and the softwareID. How would you go about the actual table entities. e.g do I just create a 3rd table with 30+ fields to cater for each software ID?

[wisewood]

// relational_table
id
SoftwareID
ComputerID

"select * from relational_table where SoftwareID = 7"


This will give you all the computer id's which have the software installed which has a softwareID of 7.

If you wanted to know what was installed on a particular computer you could then do this;

"select * from relational_table where ComputerID = 3"

So you end up with the SoftwareID's of all the software installed onto computer number 3.

Hope this makes sense.

[misterph]

Aaaah, GOD i can't beleive i was that blank. Thanks ever soo much mate, you've just woken me up :)

Cheers again wisewood - your truely wise [img src=\"style_emoticons/[#EMO_DIR#]/wink.gif\" style=\"vertical-align:middle\" emoid=\":wink:\" border=\"0\" alt=\"wink.gif\" /]

phil