Changing a number every 24 hours

[flipper828]

Hello to everyone!

 

I have a webpage that displays a number.  I want this number to change every 24 hours for anyone that visits the site.  Right now, I am manually changing this number each day.

 

For the last year, I have searched help websites, consulted many many books and consulted with a couple of programmers I know that seem to not even understand what I am talking about.   

 

Would someone give me a hand in learning how to do this?  Your help would be so much appreciated.  To give you an idea of my knowledge level, what I have learned comes from an online php beginner and intermediate class and then some playing aorund and testing from books.  Little, I know, and I apologize in advanced.  

 

Thanks

[AbraCadaver]

Where do the numbers come from?

[flipper828]

Thank you for being so quick!

 

I just pluck them out of the air when updating the site.  

 

However, I have read something about putting a list of numbers in a .txt file.  There is no database connected to this site so the .txt file (if that is an option) would probably be the easiest.  

 

I hope I am making sense to you.  

[AbraCadaver]

Thank you for being so quick!

 

I just pluck them out of the air when updating the site.  

 

However, I have read something about putting a list of numbers in a .txt file.  There is no database connected to this site so the .txt file (if that is an option) would probably be the easiest.  

 

I hope I am making sense to you.  

 

It's pretty easy to do, but can the numbers just be random?  What parameters do they have?  Are they any number between 0 and infinity or what?

[flipper828]

Any random number between 50 and 5000.  

 

I don't understand what you're asking about parameters.  I'm sorry.

[AbraCadaver]

Well, I meant the rules or conditions pertaining to the numbers.  I guess I'm trying to get more information.  When does the 24 hours start?  Midnight?  Noon?  Another time?

[AbraCadaver]

Can the numbers be reused later?

[Ch0cu3r]

Is this number a part of a date? You could look into using the date function

http://php.net/date

 

You need to give us more info of what this number does.

[flipper828]

Oh Ok.  

 

The numbers can be reused and the ideally, I would like it to change at midnight EST.  

 

The number is not going to do anything but inform the visitor about the number of changes that have happened since the day before.  It will have a hyperlink to a .pdf I have but I know how to do the hyperlink.  

 

Thank you both so much.  I know this has to be frustrating.  

[AbraCadaver]

So you are going to use a random number for the number of changes?  So this is not meant to be accurate?  Just something to get them to download the pdf?

[Ch0cu3r]

Still need more info. What changes? 

[flipper828]

The number does not have to be accurate to the number of changes to a data point spreadsheet I have available each day.  However, that IS a future project.  

 

For now, I just want a different number to display each day which is linked to a .pdf which explains the data points on the spreadsheet.  

 

Does this make more sense?  *fingers crossed*

Edited September 23, 2013 by flipper828

[AbraCadaver]

Not extensively tested, but try:

date_default_timezone_set('America/New_York');
$file = 'number.txt';
$date = $number = 0;

if(file_exists($file)) {
    list($date, $number) = file($file, FILE_IGNORE_NEW_LINES);
}
if((time()) > strtotime('+24 hours', $date)) {
    $date = strtotime('midnight');
    $number = mt_rand(50, 5000);
    file_put_contents($file, "$date\n$number");
}
echo $number;

[Ch0cu3r]

You've lost me.

date('z');

will give you the day of the year. It'll reset to 1  on 1st Jan 2014 tho.

[kicken]

mt_rand - you can use that to just generate a random number.

mt_srand - This seeds the random number generator with an initial value. Using the same seed will cause mt_rand to generate the same number

date - This will let you get the current date.

 

So, to get a random number that changes each day, seed the number generator with the current date and then call mt_rand.

[AbraCadaver]

mt_rand - you can use that to just generate a random number.

mt_srand - This seeds the random number generator with an initial value. Using the same seed will cause mt_rand to generate the same number

date - This will let you get the current date.

 

So, to get a random number that changes each day, seed the number generator with the current date and then call mt_rand.

 

I'll be damned! 

date_default_timezone_set('America/New_York');
mt_srand(date('Ymd'));
$number = mt_rand(50, 5000);
mt_srand();  //reset for other calls

echo $number;

[flipper828]

Oh thank you so much everyone!  I'm off to try this and I'll be back.

 

You people have always been to nice and kind!  

[flipper828]

Thank you so much Kicken and AbraCadaver for your generosity!  Surprise....I've not hear of mt_rand and mt_srand in my research and studies.  Thank you for the links.  I want to go back and study these soon.