PHP - Add Data To Text File?

Hi

I'm learning php and trying to write a script to extract registration information from a large text file. Sadly my meagre knowledge of php is letting me down a bit. It's a case of knowing what you want the script to do but not having the knowlege of how to 'say it'.

So i was hoping that if I posted my code here someone could either give me a few pointers on where i am going wrong or suggest  a better way.

The text file data luckily has a recurring format as follows (for brevity i've only included one entry, which contains made up information):



From:   bella_done@yahoo.co.uk
Sent:   02 February 2011 22:50
To:   Jonny tum, patsy fells, dingly bongo
Subject:   Subject: Fun Run 2010

Categories:   Fun Run

Name: Bella Donna
 Address: 14 brondle avenue
 Postcode: cd83 1rg
 Phone: 0287343510
 Email: bella_don@yahoo.co.uk
 DOB: 15/11/1945
 Half or Full: Full fun run
 How did you hear: Took part in 2010

As you can see the data has a convenient boundary at the 'from' field and the colon (or so it occurred to me) so I created my script as follows:



// the string being analysed
$the_string = "
From:

bella_done@yahoo.co.uk
Sent:

02 February 2011 22:50
To:

Jonny tum, patsy fells, dingly bongo
Subject:

Subject: Fun Run 2010

Categories:

Fun Run

Name: Bella Donna 
 Address: 14 brondle avenue 
 Postcode: cd83 1rg 
 Phone: 0287343510 
 Email: bella_don@yahoo.co.uk 
 DOB: 15/11/1945 
 Half or Full: Full fun run 
 How did you hear: Took part in 2010";

// remove all formatting to work with a clean string

$clean_string = strip_tags($the_string);



// remove form field entries from the data and replace with commas and a ZZZ boundary

$remove_fields = array("Categories:" => "","Name:" => ",","Address:" => ",","Postcode:" => ",","Phone:" => 

",","Email:" => ",","DOB:" => ",","Half or Full:" => ",","How did you hear:" => ",","From:" => "ZZZ","Sent:" => 

",","To:" => ",",  );


$new_string = strtr("$clean_string",$remove_fields);


// split the data at the boundary ZZZ

$string_to_array = explode("ZZZ", $new_string);

$new_string2 = implode("</br>",$string_to_array);

echo $new_string2; 




$myFile = "address_list.csv";
 $fh = fopen($myFile, 'w') or die("can't open file");
 $stringData = $new_string2;
 fwrite($fh, $stringData);
 fclose($fh);




One major problem is when i write the new data to a csv file the csv contains spacings that cause it to be reproduced in a column form rather than as separate fields for each comma boundary.

So can anyone suggest either

a) a better way of extracting the data from the text file (doesn't need to be 100% clean and perfect)

b) How can i stop the spaces in the csv (i thought i would have fixed this when i stripped the tags from the string at the start??).

Any help would be greatly received by a newbie phper.

It's my first shot at performing anything moderately taxing so if I've made some blaring oversites I would very much welcome your wisdom!

Thank you

Drongo

I have a very simple system (few files) having simple articles (only title and a paragraph description) stored in single text files. I catch the data by

Code: [Select]
$data=file('article1.txt');
$title=$data[0];
$description=$data[1];
This simple system works perfectly, but the problem appears when increasing the number of files (e.g. more than 10,000 articles). This is a problem connected with the OS behavior for handling huge number of files. My first question: Is there theoretically a faster system (e.g. database-based) for retrieving data, comparing with retrieving from plain text file?

Second question: what can be an alternative for this very simple system (no search query or additional field)?

1. XML: It has the same problem if storing in different files.
2. Mysql: It is very advanced for this system.
3. SQLite:I am thinking of this, but it still have advanced structure of SQL.
4. DB Berkeley: I am not familiar with Oracle at all, and I need to install something new on my server. Is it really worth of trying?
5. Anything else?

In general, I just need fast reading the data. I have no idea how much the speed of these systems are different to determine which is worth of consideration. Thanks for sharing your idea.

Hello,    Trying to rearrange a data on the website. Looks normal when looking through preview on IE and chrome. But once moved to live website, the whole alignment changes from left to center , including the text that needs to show up. I am a newbie to coding and dont have a clue. tried puttng something together based on what i foud on the web. attaching screenshot and the code that i did. any help is highly appreciated. also attached is a screenshot of what happens when the php file is uploaded. Prior to doing that, the menu on the left is aligned properly and the assets that we have show properly.    What we are trying to do is rearrage the whole assets into different categories.    many thanks  Attached Files  portfolio.php   3.27KB   2 downloads  noalignment.png   11KB   0 downloads

I have a text file that contain something like this :

question.txt

------------------------
12/10/2010
Quest : Was a web designer really care about your web security other than thinking so hard to design your web just based on how the web will looks like?.
>>from:sombody@somwhere.com,opinion=not at all,comment:your site are cool
11/10/2010
Quest : Was a web designer really love his girl friend in other side they r almost got no time dating with her?
>>from:sombody@somwhere.net,opinion=he loves computer,comment:your site are waste.
-------------------------

All i need to do is, grabing all informations after the char ">>" and write it to another text file name "output.txt" that will contain :

output.txt
---------------------
from:sombody@somwhere.com,opinion=not at all,comment:your site are cool
from:sombody@somwhere.net,opinion=he loves computer,comment:your site are waste.
---------------------

can some one show me the way?

thanks.

Well, im a n00b for php, and what i need is a php script which will read data from .xml file and write it into .txt file. Can someone help me?
Example of .xml file :

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<tv generator-info-name="NeTXMLTV/1.0.0.0" source-info-url="http://www.net-tv.hr/" source-info-name="NeT TV XMLTV" source-data-url="http://www.net-tv.hr/xmltv/net-pregled-programa-xmltv.xml">
  <programme channel="NeT TV" start="20110413063000 +0200" stop="20110413080000 +0200">
    <title lang="hr">JUTARNJI EXPRESS</title>
    <category lang="hr">glazbeno-informativni program</category>
    <desc lang="hr">Glazbeno informativna emisija sa servisnim informacijama i jutarnjim temperaturama, idealna za jutarnje buđenje uz toplu kavu ili čaj....</desc>
  </programme>
</tv>

I need the .txt file to look like this:
201104130630 - 201104130800
JUTARNJI EXPRESS
glazbeno-informativni program
Glazbeno informativna emisija sa servisnim informacijama i jutarnjim temperaturama, idealna za jutarnje buđenje uz toplu kavu ili čaj....

Can someone please help me? thanks

I currently am working on a project where I code a "simple" telephone directory.

There are three main tasks that it needs to do:
1. Directory.php(index page) has a "First Name" and "Last Name" field and a search button. When a name is searched from the directory.txt file, it displays First Name, Last Name, Address, City, State, Zip and phone in findinfo.php in designated text boxes...first name, last name, etc.

2. From the findinfo.php, like previously stated, the users information is listed in the appropriate text boxes. From there, there is an update button that will overwrite the user's information to directory.txt if that button is selected. It will then say the write was sucessful.

3. (completed this step) From the index page, there is a link that will take you to addnew.php where you enter First Name, Last Name, Address, City, State, Zip and phone in a web form and write it to directory.txt.

 This is the php code for the third step:

<?php
$newentryfile = fopen("directory.txt", "a+");
$firstname = $_POST['fname'];
$lastname = $_POST['lname'];
$address = $_POST['address'];
$city = $_POST['city'];
$state = $_POST['state'];
$zip = $_POST['zip'];
$phone = $_POST['phone'];
$newentry = "$firstname $lastname\n\r $address\n\r $city, $state $zip\n\r $phone\n\r";
if (flock($newentryfile, LOCK_EX)) {
if (fwrite($newentryfile, $newentry) > 0)
echo "<p>" . stripslashes($firstname) . " " .
 stripslashes($lastname) . " has been added to the directory.</p>";
else
echo "<p>Registration error!</p>";
flock($newentryfile, LOCK_UN);
}
else
echo "<p>Cannot write to the file. Please try again later</p>";
fclose($newentryfile);

if(empty($firstname) || empty($lastname) || empty($address) || empty($city) || empty ($state) || empty($zip) || empty($phone))
{
echo "<p>Please go back and fill out all fields.</p>";
}
?>


So to sum it all up, what would be my best approach? I am totally stumped and not sure which function to use. Should I work my way from step 1 to step 2? I see it as when I do the search for the name from directory.php, it takes me to findinfo.php, listing the users information in the text boxes. From there, if I needed to, having the user's information already listed I could hit the update button to overwrite the new information to directory.txt. Doing the update when then tell me that the write was successful.

I have literally been scouring the internet for hours. What would be the best function to do this? I hope I was clear enough. Please help me out and thank you for your time.

Hi,

I am writing several scripts and some are used to amend extra information to a text file. However, I added a hyperlink to the text file so that the user can go back to a page where they can add extra information. However, since I have done this every time I amend more text to the text file, the extra text appears below the hyperlink rather than above it, and I was wondering if there was a way around this.

My amend code is as follows:

Code: [Select]
<html>
<head>
<title>Amend File</title>
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" a href="rcm/stylesheet.css">
</head>
<?php

if($_POST['append'] !=null)
{
$filename="C:/xampp/htdocs/rcm/denman2.txt";
$file=fopen($filename, "a");
$msg="<p>Updated Information: " .$_POST['append']. "</p><br>";
fputs ($file, $msg);
fclose($file);
}
?>
<body>
<h1>Do you want to append to a document?</h1>
Enter Updated Information:
<form action="amendfile2.php" method="post">
<input type="text" size="40" name="append"><br><br>
<input type="submit" value="Add updated information to report">
</form>
<form action="viewfile3.php" method="post">
<input type="submit" size="40" value="View Web Blog">
</form>
<form action="loginform.php" method="post">
<input type="submit" value="Click here to go to the Log In Screen">
</form>
</body></html>

And my text file is as follows:
Code: [Select]
<h1>Accident Report</h1>

<p>First Name: Andrew
Last Name: Denman
Age: 18
Complete Weeks Since Accident: 2<br>

<a href="amendfile2.php">Amend to this file</a>

Any help would be appreciated

Ok i have been working on this for a day+ now. here is my delema

simple .ini text file. when a user makes a change (via html form) it makes the correct adjustments.
problem is the newline issue

1. if i put a "\n" at the end (when using fputs) works great, except everytime they edit the file it keeps adding a new line (i.e. 10 edits there are now 10 blank lines!!!!)
2. if i leave off the "\n" it appends the next "fgets" to that lilne making a mess

Code: [Select]
##-- Loop thruoght the ORIGINAL file
    while( ! feof($old))
    {
        ##-- Get a line of text
        $aline = fgets($old);
       
        ##-- We only need to check for "="
        if(strpos($aline,"=") > 0 )
        {
            ##-- Write NEW data to tmp file
            fputs($tmp,$info[$i]." = ".$rslt[$i]."\n");
            $i++;
        }
        ##-- No Match
        else
        {
            fputs($tmp,$aline."\n");
        }//Checking for match
    }//while eof(old)
   

what in the world is making this such a big deal. i dont remember having this issue in the past
I tried opening with w+, and just w on the temp file

a typical text line would be

some fieldname = some value

the scipt cycles through the file ignoring comments that are "#"


ps
the tmp file will overwrite the origianl once complete

all i really want to know is WHY i cant get the newline to work, and what is the suggested fix

EDIT:
i just tried PHP_EOL and it still appends another newline

Hi,

I need some help, im trying to extract data from a file and display results as text.

Example.

File:   TitanicRomance1990.jpg

Output:

Movie Name: Titanic

Year : 1990

 

Thank you in Advanced.

hello,

(firts of all, I'm not a php-expert, I just understand the code a little, but I can't write it myself..)

I'm using the attached php file (which I found online) to get data out of the attached xml file.(had to rename it to .doc to get it uploaded)

What I actually want is the following:
From every "User" element showing the attribute "LoginName",
and then show under every "LoginName" all the (element)"Contact" and (attributes) "Name" and "Email", right now I just can get the Name, or Email..

example what I would like to have: (using the attached iebo.xml)

LoginName: Dirk
 Contact Name="dirk" Email="dirk@dirk.nl"
 Contact Name="dirk2" Email="dirk2@dirk.nl"
LoginName: test1
 Contact Name="test" Email="test@test.nl"
 Contact Name="test2" Email="test2@test.nl"

Thanks for any help in advance

Dirk

Hi,
I'm quite new to PHP and I'd like to know if there's a way for me to use some PHP solution to get data from another PHP file instead of used AJAX.
My intention is to have some kind of a loop in one PHP file that'll have a variable that gets the returned data from a different PHP file on every iteration and does something with it.
Would be simple enough to do it with Ajax but I can't use it in this instance.
Any thoughts?

hello,

I need xml file as playlist.xml and i want to retrive data from my mysql table. I have the following code as i am trying to use php code inside playlist.xml file.
Code: [Select]
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>

<xml>
<?php

$dbhost='localhost';
$dbuser='pavel';
$dbpass='pavel123';
mysql_connect($dbhost,$dbuser,$dbpass);
mysql_select_db("amarmusic");

$sql=("select *from  bband where artist='Meghdol' and album='Drohe Montre Valobasha';");
$res = mysql_query($sql);

while ($result = mysql_fetch_array($res)){
    ?>
        <track>
            <path> <? $result['link']?></path>
            <title><? $result['title']?></title>
        </track>
    <?
}
?>
</xml>

but unfortunately its not working. any1 have any idea how to fix it? please help me.

Hi,

I am updating a few parts of my current website.
Currently, the website updates user accounts by uploading CSV data reports.

I currently use fgetcsv to deal with each row and this is taking forever to deal with the data as this is currently the code for each row.


while (($data = fgetcsv($handle, 1000, ",")) !== FALSE)
{
$grabinfo = "SELECT * FROM transactions WHERE id = '$data[$i]'";
$grabinforesult = mysql_query($grabinfo) or die(mysql_error());
while($row = mysql_fetch_array($grabinforesult)){
$merchant = $row['merchant'];
$username = $row['username'];
$datetime = $row['datetime'];
$letthem = $row['letthem'];
$validate = "SELECT * FROM transactions WHERE merchant = '$merchant' and username = '$username' and (status='pending' or status='success' or status='confirmed') and datetime='$datetime'";
$validator = mysql_query($validate) or die(mysql_error());
if(mysql_num_rows($validator) >= $letthem)
{
$import="UPDATE transactions SET amount='0.00' WHERE id='$data[$i]' and status ='awaiting'";
mysql_query($import) or die(mysql_error());
}}


 

mysql_query($import) or die(mysql_error());
} fclose($handle);


This is performing lots of checks on the csv data and checking it with the system. It checks each row.
Is there a quicker way of reading the csv data? There are lots of checks and while loops within the fgetcsv while loop. It can take upto half an hour to process a file with 1000 csv rows.

Hope someone could offer some advise.

Thanks

Hello,

How can I get the id in the search bar into the viewuser.php file

...

 <?php foreach($myObjectMap as $key => $item): ?>
                    <tr>
                      
                      <td>
                      <a href="viewuser.php?id=<?PHP echo $item->ID; ?>">
                      <?PHP echo $item->UserName; ?>
                      </td>
                        ...

 

Hi,

I am not that versed in PHP.  I have been working with this snippet of code that I found on a tutorial site.  It works like 97% and I get the format  mostly like I need it. 

Except, I can not figure how to add an extra single node to the list.

The code generates 20 random numbers and puts them into an array.  The array is then used to create a numbers node in the xml file.  It goes through and creates all the nodes.  I can not seem to figure out how to put a single game numbernode at the top of all the numbers nodes.

I am also not  understanding how to write the output to create the actual xml file.  I have written code in the past  to write a string to a text file but I am not sure about this because it is in an array?  The xml file will be appended every 5 minutes for data comparison down the road.    I think I will need to add a routine that calls the data back in at the beginning of the script and looks for the last game number if it is there and add 1.  The game number must increment each time it is appended. 

Any ideas on how to finish this up?

The final out put will look like this.  I only did a few lines instead of all 20 numbers to keep this short.

Code: [Select]
<?xml version="1.0">
<Container>
     <gamenumber>10</gamenumber>
     <numbers>47</numbers>
     <numbers>10</numbers>
     <numbers>5</numbers>
     <numbers>27</numbers>
</Container>

My Script
Code: [Select]
  <?php
  $balls = range(1,80);
  shuffle($balls);
  $pick = array_slice($balls,1,20);
  //$drawn = implode(", ",$pick);
  $arraySize = sizeof($pick);
 // print ("Arraw is $drawn\n\n");
  
  $doc = new DOMDocument();
  $doc->formatOutput = true;
  
  $drawn = array();
  $r = $doc->createElement( "Container" );
  $doc->appendChild( $r );
  
   for ($i=0; $i!= $arraySize; $i++){
  $drawn [] = array(
  'numbers' => $pick[$i],
  );
  }  
  
  foreach( $drawn as $draw )
  {    
  $numbers = $doc->createElement( "numbers" );
  $numbers->appendChild(
  $doc->createTextNode( $draw['numbers'] )
  );
  $r->appendChild( $numbers);
  
  }
    
  echo $doc->saveXML();
  ?>


Thanks for  your advise and help!!!