PHP / AJAX Chat Timing Feature

RyanMinor · November 11, 2011

I am coding a timed chat feature and here is how I have it planned out so far:

A user purchases minutes to use for chatting. Those are stored in a database.

A user logs in to chat with life coach.

They are taken to the main page called live.php which has a "Start" and "Stop" button.

When they click the "Start" button I want a function to fire that counts to 1 minute and then begins updating the database table each minute (by subtracting 1 minute from their alloted minutes).

If they click "Stop" I want the function to pause and when they click "Start" again I want it to resume.

I wanted to store the results of the function in a div that would countdown the user's remaining time.

This is my first stab at this type of software so if you think it sucks or could be done a better way then by all means, let me know. My code is below.

live.php (This is the page that users will be viewing during the live chat)

<?php
$page = 'chat/live';
include_once('configure.php');
require_once('libraries/Chat.php');
$chat = new Chat();
$startMinutes = $chat->getMinutes($_SESSION['chat_id']);
$userInfo = $chat->getUserInfo($_SESSION['chat_id']);
?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd">
<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
<head>
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" />
<title><?php echo SITE_NAME; ?> | <?php echo $pageInfo['page_title']; ?></title>
<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo $pageInfo['page_keywords']; ?>" />
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo $pageInfo['page_description']; ?>" />
<link href="<?php echo CSS_PATH; ?>global.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />
<script type="text/javascript" src="<?php echo JAVASCRIPT_PATH; ?>jquery-1.6.3.js"></script>
<script language="JavaScript">
function startTimer() {
$.ajax({
	type: 'POST',
	url: 'timer.php',
	success: function(data) {
		$("#minutes").html(data);
		time = setTimeout(startTimer, 5000);
	},
});
}
function stopTimer() {
clearTimeout(time);
}
</script>
</head>

<body>

<!-- HEADER -->
<div id="header"></div>
<!-- / HEADER -->

<!-- MENU -->
<?php include(INCLUDE_PATH . 'menu.php'); ?>
<!-- / MENU -->

<!-- CONTENT -->
<div id="content">

<!-- POSTS -->
<div id="posts">
	<h2 class="title"><?php echo $pageInfo['page_title']; ?></h2>
	<p><?php echo $pageInfo['page_content']; ?></p>
        
        <p align="center">Welcome! You are logged in as <?php echo $userInfo['chat_username']; ?>. 
        	Before beginning this chat you had <?php echo $startMinutes['chat_minutes']; ?> minutes.</p>
        
        <div id="minutes"></div>
        
        <p align="center">Video Box Here | AJAX Chat Box Here</p>

	<p align="center"><a href="#" onclick="startTimer()">START</a> | <a href="#" onclick="stopTimer()">STOP</a></p>

	<!-- BOTTOM AD -->
	<?php include(INCLUDE_PATH . 'bottom_ad.php'); ?>
        <!-- / BOTTOM AD -->

</div>
<!-- / POSTS-->

<!-- SIDEBAR -->
<?php include(INCLUDE_PATH . 'sidebar.php'); ?>
<?php include(INCLUDE_PATH . 'sidebar_ad.php'); ?>
<!-- / SIDEBAR -->

<div style="clear: both;"> </div>

</div>
<!-- / CONTENT-->

<!-- FOOTER -->
<?php include(INCLUDE_PATH . 'footer.php'); ?>
<!-- / FOOTER -->

</body>
</html>

timer.php (This is the page that calculates the time and displays it)

<?php $update = $chat->subtractMinute($_SESSION['chat_id']); ?>

<?php $minutes = $chat->getMinutes($_SESSION['chat_id']); ?>
<p align="center">You now have <?php echo $minutes; ?> minutes left.</p>

Like I said I am not sure if I am going about this the right way, but I've already spent about a day on it and do not want to waste anymore time. That's why I've come to you guys hoping for some help. Thanks in advance!

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PHP / AJAX Chat Timing Feature

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