how to create a social network

[ohdang888]

roughly how would one go about creating a "add as friend" and "message this person" options... tips or tutorials???

 

i already have  user system with profiles, but i can't figure out how "add as friend" would work...

[unsider]

Similar to myspace-esque capabilities?

 

And I too wouldn't mind looking at some of these tutorials, if any exist.

 

Unlikely though.

[ohdang888]

exactly!

 

 

i can't seem to figure out how it works.

 

The message table must be like 200 columns big!

[me1000]

create a table for friends,

 

columns like:

ID, USERID, FRIENDID

 

it isnt very efficient but it will work if your user base isn't too large. 

 

for messages,

ID, FROM, TO, READ, DATE, MESSAGE

 

READ is set to a 0 as soon as a message is sent then set to 1 when the recipient sees it.

 

these things are complicated, you wont find too many people giving tutorials on it. There is a reason MySpace and Facebook make millions of dollars ever month!

[trq]

Realistically, if you need to ask these questions you need to learn more php before attempting to build something like this.

 

Once you know php well enough, theres not much you can't do by simply sitting down to think things through a little. If you can't think of the logical pathway through a problem, chances are you need more skills in php.

[cooldude832]

a project of this magnitude is asking for Oject Oriented Programing which you probably don't know so I suggest you start with php and move there