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PHP Dynamic Includes - Tutorials - in Obscuro

dinamic include for templating website

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34 views

PHP Dynamic Includes - Tutorials - in Obscuro

dinamic include for templating website

Uploaded by

tuxberyl
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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PHP dynamic includes | tutorials | In obscuro http://inobscuro.

com/tutorials/print/16/

Photoshop brushes Website templates Textures Tutorials About


Standard version (h$p://inobscuro.com/tutorials/php-dynamic-includes-16/)

Dynamic inclusion in PHP


This tutorial will teach you how to make updaBng layout and changing links a lot easier, and your links to be generated in the form
index.php?page=mypage, using the include(); funcBon.
If you're not familiar with the progamming language PHP, I suggest you to read the Introduc:on to PHP (h$p://inobscuro.com/tutorials
/read/13/) before you conBnue.

Step 1: Make separate files


make empty files named index.php, page1.php, page2.php, page3.php. Now add content.
index.php - this file contains only the layout. The content space is empty. Remember, this is an actual html file, which means it
must have the basic HTML structure (<html> <head> </head> <body> </body> </html>) and what comes in between.
page1.php, page2.php, page3.php - these 3 files contain only the content. No layout. Just throw on some headings, paragraphs of
text and images here.

Step 2: Include content


To the place provided for content content in index.php, copy the following code:

<?php
$page = $_GET['page']; /* gets the variable $page */
if (!empty($page)) {
include($page);
} /* if $page has a value, include it */
else {
include('page1.php');
} /* otherwise, include the default page */
?>

You can name $page anything you want - $x, $y, $go...
Since obviously you didn't set the value for $page in any way, opening index.php will always display page1.php. How to change
this?
Make links: page 1, page 2, page 3. Each of them should state this:

<a href="index.php?page=page1.php">page 1</a>

Ofcourse, change the nuber 1 to 2 or 3 as needed.


What does this do? This link opens the page index.php, and sets the variable $page to value 'page1.php'. So, the code we wrote
before will check if variable $page is set - obviously, it is. Next, it will include the file defined by $page. Each Bme we click one of
the links, the page index.php opens over again, but with different content, that depends on which link we clicked because $page
changes with each click. Uh, I hope you got this right because I really can't explain it different.

Step 4: Making it look snazzy

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PHP dynamic includes | tutorials | In obscuro http://inobscuro.com/tutorials/print/16/

The link index.php?page=page1.php doesn't look that great. If we could get rid of that .php on the tail it would be be$er.
Well, it's easy, if we know how to connect strings in PHP. And we do. (Have you read the Introduc:on to PHP (h$p://inobscuro.com
/tutorials/read/13/) ?)
Change all links to <a href="index.php?page=page1">page 1</a> (delete the .php at the end of the link). Then add the
following line to the code before the include funcBon:

$page .= '.php';

The line above is short for $page = $page . '.php'; The enBre code should then look like this:

<?php
$page = $_GET['page'];
if (!empty($page)) {
$page .= '.php';
include($page);
}
else {
include('page1.php');
}
?>

You're done! There is only something else we can do to make sure it includes only the files we want it to, a security patch if you
want to call it so. We will create an array of strings $pages containing filenames that are allowed to be included. If the page
defined by variable $page is not in the array, it will display the message: “Page not found. Return to index”.

<?php
$page = $_GET['page'];
$pages = array('page1', 'page2', 'page3');
if (!empty($page)) {
if(in_array($page,$pages)) {
$page .= '.php';
include($page);
}
else {
echo 'Page not found. Return to
<a href="index.php">index</a>';
}
}
else {
include('page1.php');
}
?>

So, when you add more pages to your website, you will also need to add them to the array $pages to make it work :)
What's great about this method is that any Bme you decide to change the layout, you will only need to change the file index.php
All other files remain exactly the same! :D

Including files from different folders


Someone asked me if this was possible. It is, and it's not very different from what you learned earlier.
If you have a folder named /info and inside it a page called faq.php, you can include it in the index.php file located in the root
folder. The link would look like this:

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PHP dynamic includes | tutorials | In obscuro http://inobscuro.com/tutorials/print/16/

<a href="index.php?category=info&page=faq">FAQ</a>

Including the file would look like this:

<?php
$url = '';
if (!empty($_GET['category'])) {
$url .= $_GET['category'] . '/';
}
if (!empty($_GET['page'])) {
$url .= $_GET['page'] . '.php';
}
include $url;
?>

The above example works in cases when category (folder) is defined, and it works when it's not defined as well.
Hope this tutorial was helpful. Good luck!

Copyright © 2004-2014. Nela Dunato, all rights reserved.

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