Some help with sql_query

[foreverhex]

Ive been using php for a while now, but I am still new at MySQL. I had a question about how to retrieve data from a sql table. i believe I use the sql_query to do it but Im not sure. Below is my example.

[list]
[*]-ppl submit art and info with it
-it stored to Mysql under the table "art" with a row called medium (photo, draw, cg)
-there is a page that pulls up this art called "art.php"
-if you goto the photography page (art.php?medium=photo) it shows only photos
-if you go to drawing ect ect.
-how do i make it grab only the art i request instead of the entire art table?
-also how do I go about making a flexible html table to desplay this info?
-is it hard to do pagination with all this?
[/list]

Thanks for the help, someone always comes through and hits the nail on the head.

[gijew]

I may be able to answer a few of those questions...

If each row has a unique number tied to it in MySQL called a primary key, you can use that to easily and safely display an individual row.

Example: <a href="art.php?photo=medium&photoID=1">Click for medium photo</a>
You can write a simple conditional or switch() to get it to display what you're looking for (I prefer switch).

This is just a simple guestimation of what to do.

[code]
<?PHP
switch ($_GET['Photo') {
  default:
    echo 'whatever it is you want to be displayed by default.';
  break;

  case 'medium';
    // If the user has opted to select an individual photo, store the WHERE clause in a variable so we don't have to double up on our work.
    if ($_GET['photoID']) {
      $PhotoConditional = 'WHERE photo_id = $_GET[photoID]';
    }
    $SQL_Photo = MySQL_Query("SELECT photo FROM art $PhotoConditional");
    while ($r = MySQL_Fetch_Array($SQL_Photo)) {
        echo $r['photo'].'<br />';
    }
  break;
)
?>
[/code]

The above switch() should in theory display either all data or a single photo.  If you want all, just don't include the photoID in the URL.

Pagination is an entirely and painful subject.  I recommend going into the tutorials on this website and read the one there to get a better understanding of what to do.

[Barand]

art table
-----------
art_id (PK)
artist_id
image_path
medium (= 'photo', 'draw' etc)

If user selects photo page

SELECT * FROM art WHERE medium = 'photo'

[fenway]

The pagination is really the hardest part of all this... you have run some fancy SQL to get the entire result set count efficiently.

[foreverhex]

Thx Barand for helping me on my table layout and gijew for the sample code. I tried it our and its seems to be working pretty good. Ill do some altering and send a link so that you guys can check it out when its done. THX!