Is there a better way than die()

[AdRock]

I would like to find a better way of stopping this script from trying to list results if none exist

 

at the moment I use this

  if(!$result) die(mysql_error()); 
     $err = mysql_num_rows($result); 
       if($err == 0) die("No matches met your criteria.");

 

but it stop the rest of the page displaying.  Is there a better way of displaying the rest of the page without trying to create an empty table?

 

$result = mysql_query("Select count(*) from carshare") 
or die (mysql_error()); 
$numrows = mysql_fetch_row($result); 
  
if(isset($_GET['pagenum'])?$page = $_GET['pagenum']:$page = 1); 
$entries_per_page = 45;   

$total_pages = ceil($numrows[0]/$entries_per_page); 
$offset = (($page * $entries_per_page) - $entries_per_page); 

$result = mysql_query("SELECT `id`,`user`,`seats_available`,`start_street`,`start_postcode`,`start_lat`,`start_long`,
 `end_street`,`end_postcode`,`end_lat`,`end_long`,`depart_time` FROM carshare ORDER BY `id` LIMIT  
                       $offset,$entries_per_page");
  if(!$result) die(mysql_error()); 
     $err = mysql_num_rows($result); 
       if($err == 0) die("No matches met your criteria."); 

function DisplayURL($url) {
    if (strlen($url) > 30) return(substr($url,0,30) . '...');
    else return($url);
}

echo "<table id='MyTable' class='style3'>\n";
echo "<tr><th colspan='2'> </th><th colspan='2'>Start of Route</th><th colspan='2'>End of Route</th></tr>
<tr><th>Seats</th><th>Depart</th><th>Street</th><th>Postcode</th><th>Street</th><th>Postcode</th></tr>\n";

$z = 0;

while($row=mysql_fetch_array($result))
    {

    $seats = htmlentities($row['seats_available']);
    $start_street = htmlentities($row['start_street']);
    $start_postcode = htmlentities($row['start_postcode']);
    $end_street = htmlentities($row['end_street']);
    $end_postcode = htmlentities($row['end_postcode']);
    $depart = htmlentities($row['depart_time']);

    if($z % 2==0)
    { //this means if there is a remainder
        echo "<tr class='yellow'>\n";
$z++;
    }
    	else
    { //if there isn't a remainder we will do the else
        echo "<tr class='white'>\n";
$z++;
    }
    	echo "<td>".$seats."</td><td>".$depart."</td><td>".$start_street."</td><td>".$start_postcode."</td><td>".$end_street."</td><td>".$end_postcode."</td>\n";
    	echo "</tr>\n";
    }
//now let's close the table and be done with it
echo "</table>\n";

[Psycho]

It's not that there are no records to display. Using die in that fashion means there was a critical error when trying to run the query. But, you can (and should) take an approach that exits the script gracefully.

 

Note: You should create your queries as variables so you can echo them to the page when there is an error:

 

Example:

<?php

$query = "Select count(*) from carshare";
$result = mysql_query($query);

if (!$result) {

  echo "The query:<br>$query<br><br>";
  echo "failed with the following error:<br>".mysql_error();

} else {

  //display the results

}

//Continue with rest of page

?>