Dynamic Months

[Xtremer360]

I'm trying to figure out for the months I can get it to display the last 5 months including the current month. The reason for this is I"m going to get the total number of hits for my website  for each month as well as the number of successful logins for my CMS script. Any thoughts?

 

<table class="visualize_dashboard">
				<caption>
					Dashboard Chart Example
				</caption>
				<thead>
					<tr>
						<td></td>
						<th scope="col">March</th>
						<th scope="col">April</th>
						<th scope="col">May</th>
						<th scope="col">June</th>
						<th scope="col">July</th>
					</tr>
				</thead>
				<tbody>
					<tr>
						<th scope="row">Visits</th>
						<td>175</td>
						<td>145</td>
						<td>212</td>
						<td>175</td>
						<td>182</td>
					</tr>
					<tr>
						<th scope="row">Logins</th>
						<td>94</td>
						<td>53</td>
						<td>124</td>
						<td>92</td>
						<td>105</td>
					</tr>
				</tbody>
			</table>

[xyph]

Have you at least attempted this?

 

All I see is HTML. Show me some code and I'll help further.

 

Do you need the year as well? Do you need the number of days in the given month?

[Xtremer360]

I know how to do the date function but I"m not sure how to have it display just the last 5 monts.

[xyph]

Have you at least attempted this? ... Show me some code and I'll help further.

[Xtremer360]

Is this right?

 

echo date("M") ;

echo date("M", strtotime("-1 month") ) ;

echo date("M", strtotime("-2 month") ) ;

echo date("M", strtotime("-3 month") ) ;

echo date("M", strtotime("-4 month") ) ;

 

 

[xyph]

That will work, but using the date function is slow, so if we can avoid using it multiple times it's better.

 

Here's how I would approach this

 

<?php 

$month = date('M');
for( $i = 0; $i < 5; $i++ ) {
echo $month.' ';
$month = getPrevMonth($month);
}

function getPrevMonth( $month ) {
// Build an array of months, 0 = Jan, 11 = Dec
$months = array('Jan','Feb','Mar','Apr','May','Jun',
	'Jul','Aug','Sep','Oct','Nov','Dec');
// Grab the key of the current month, if it can't be found, return FALSE
if( ($n = array_search($month,$months)) === FALSE ) return FALSE;
// If month is Jan, return Dec
if( $n == 0 ) return $months[11];
// Otherwise, return key-1
else return $months[$n-1];
}

?>

 

Then again, there's nothing wrong with your solution.

[Pikachu2000]

EDIT: Pretty much what xyph said . . . ^^^

 

Something like this would work, so you don't have to keep calling date():

<?php
$months = array( 1 => 'JANUARY', 'FEBRUARY', 'MARCH', 'APRIL', 'MAY', 'JUNE', 'JULY', 'AUGUST', 'SEPTEMBER', 'OCTOBER', 'NOVEMBER', 'DECEMBER' );

$cur_month = (int) date('m');
echo '<select name="month">';
for( $i = $cur_month; $i > ($cur_month - 5) ; $i-- ) {
   echo "<option value=\"$i\">$months[$i]</option>\n";
}
echo '</select>';

[Xtremer360]

That will work, but using the date function is slow, so if we can avoid using it multiple times it's better.

 

Here's how I would approach this

 

<?php 

$month = date('M');
for( $i = 0; $i < 5; $i++ ) {
echo $month.' ';
$month = getPrevMonth($month);
}

function getPrevMonth( $month ) {
// Build an array of months, 0 = Jan, 11 = Dec
$months = array('Jan','Feb','Mar','Apr','May','Jun',
	'Jul','Aug','Sep','Oct','Nov','Dec');
// Grab the key of the current month, if it can't be found, return FALSE
if( ($n = array_search($month,$months)) === FALSE ) return FALSE;
// If month is Jan, return Dec
if( $n == 0 ) return $months[11];
// Otherwise, return key-1
else return $months[$n-1];
}

?>

 

Then again, there's nothing wrong with your solution.

 

So your saying if I have my dashboard.php file which handles all the php related tasks I can do this:

 

<?php 
$month = date('M');
for( $i = 0; $i < 5; $i++ ) {
echo $month.' ';
$month = getPrevMonth($month);
}

function getPrevMonth( $month ) {
// Build an array of months, 0 = Jan, 11 = Dec
$months = array('Jan','Feb','Mar','Apr','May','Jun',
	'Jul','Aug','Sep','Oct','Nov','Dec');
// Grab the key of the current month, if it can't be found, return FALSE
if( ($n = array_search($month,$months)) === FALSE ) return FALSE;
// If month is Jan, return Dec
if( $n == 0 ) return $months[11];
// Otherwise, return key-1
else return $months[$n-1];
}
?>

 

And then on my normal dashboard.php page I can do this:

<thead>
					<tr>
						<td></td>
						<th scope="col"><?php echo $month ?></th>
					</tr>
				</thead>

[xyph]

Pikachu - Don't forget to include a check for months < 1. For example, if the current month was February you would get undefined offset errors

 

@CoolAsCarlito - if that's what you want your output to be. I don't provide code you can just plug in and work - that would defeat the whole 'helping' aspect of the forum and turn it into a 'free programming' forum.

 

Modify the code I've provided to make it work for you. If there is any part you're unsure about, ask. I will NOT provide you a copy+paste solution though.

[Pikachu2000]

Quite true. I pretty much threw that together as an example for him. I should probably finish it up and save it somewhere.

[Xtremer360]

Is this where I use google analytics to get the numbers of hits to my site for each month?

[xyph]

Quite true. I pretty much threw that together as an example for him. I should probably finish it up and save it somewhere.

You could probably re-write that in the same time it would take you to find an archived version

 

Is this where I use google analytics to get the numbers of hits to my site for each month?

Que?

[Xtremer360]

Is this where I use google analytics to get the numbers of hits to my site for each month?

Que?

 

Huh?

[xyph]

In English - What?

 

You never mentioned anything about Google Analytics previously, nor are we going to support a 3rd party script or API in a PHP help forum.

 

Do you realize how difficult it is for us to test and create code for an external API we may or may not have access to?

[Xtremer360]

I didn't know much about it and just asking a general inquiry if that's the correct method to achieve it.

[xyph]

I don't know. The manual for the Google Analytics API, or a forum that supports it might be a better place to look.