PHP Central Database?

[cooldude832]

I'm just wondering if anyone has attempted or thought of a centralized database (in mysql) That can be used by anyone for centralized php data. Such as zip codes, states, people, presidents, countries really anything that could be done in a fashion of

<?php
echo "<select name=\"stuff\">";
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)){
echo "<option name=\"".$row['value']."\"".$row['value']."</option>";
}
?>

It be useful in many cases I can see

[utexas_pjm]

Are you asking if someone has created a database which anonymous users can connect to (presumably via an open port) and query?

 

If you are, I would venture to say that the answer is no.  I would think that the security liability alone would be enough to bar any attempt at such a setup.  On top of that there is the fact that servers, bandwidth, and administration come at a price and I don't see a practical way to monetize such a setup in order to offset these expenses.  The closest things I've seen to what you've described are web services.  In the web service model there is a layer of code and some markup language between the client and the persistence layer (RDBMS), ala: http://code.google.com/apis/soapsearch/reference.html.

 

Best,

 

Patrick

[Liquid Fire]

yea, no one with half a brain would allow anyone direct access to there database, what you are looking for is someone with web services to access information like that.

[TheFilmGod]

I don't see how that is useful. Simply. Why would some one query another person's database when they can create a better one that suits their needs even better?