am i doing the right thing? asp/flash

[slinky2000]

ok, im starting to learn asp,

im basically creating a dj database!

it going to be a flash dj site with all the dj's profiles, pics , mixes etc on each page,

im gonna store all the information in a database and intergrate it with flash via asp


am i doing this right, or is there something else i need to know


thanks
Slinky

[loydall]

Well,

There's quite a few things to do in setting up something like that - best thing to do is list the process that you intend to use and also the technologies - what database etc..

[slinky2000]

well im new to this whole thing and im gonna start learning asp soon enough,

its gonna be like this site:

http://www.trustthedj.com/

only local djs in ireland

I was gonna hold all the dj's names/details in a database (access) and generate buttons at the side with there names on it. if a new dj is entered into a database then a new button/name will appear and when clicked the details of the dj will appear on a main section inc hopefully a picture!



hope this helps

[loydall]

Cool.

Not sure how much asp you know but as far as that goes you need to create 1 or more pages that will display the data from the database. A couple of questions:

How much asp do you know?
Have you built your database yet?
How are you connecting to the database?
and leading on from that- what sort of hosting do you have? (i.e do you have a control panel where you can set up a dsn? otherwise you'll be using a dsn-less connection string)

If you have built your database it would be useful to know the table names and then the column names.

I'm guessing at the very least, you'd have a database with 1 table with 3 columns - ID, Name, Info where ID is your primary key set to auto-increment (I haven't used access for a while btw so this might all be guff)

Beyond that, I'd really need a bit more info and wouldn't really start the flash side of things until we have an idea of the data that we're going to be throwing at it.

Hope that helps.

[slinky2000]

i know flash very well and quite confodent with actrionscripting and the like,

but asp i know zip!

I havnt created the database yet but will be like you described, id, name ,experience, info, contact

This project is a university project and will be based on the server:

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/

and since my whole class will have acess tot his server my folder will be on:

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/

or would it be easier to get some asp hosting myself?


thanks for your help

[loydall]

I presume that you only have access to that site from within your uni? I couldn't access it myself.

First thing to figure out is whether your uni's servers will actually run asp scripts - there's many reasons why they would and wouldn't so I wont go into that. Create a file in notepad containing the following:

<% response.write "ASP IS WORKING" %>

save it as test.asp in your stefan folder and then open the page:

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/test.asp

If you just see ASP IS WORKING then we're in luck If you see anything else - an error message or even all the code in the page ie <% response write etc.... - you're going to need to either have a word with the IT people at your uni to find out if you can have asp set up for you or you might want to look at finding a host.

Once we've got that sorted, you can start building your page.

[slinky2000]

hey mate, ive emailed the technician to set me up a folder and a username and pass because i havnt it set up yet,

you can see it outside uni as soon as an index page is up

i'll get back to you when i get a folder up!

cheers

[slinky2000]

hope this helps, this email is from the technician, i've blocked out a few things:



this page is workin now

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/test.asp

----------------------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------------------


I have set up an account for you on imdasp. Here are the details:-

1. Access

You can access this server by FTP from anywhere with an Internet
connection :-

Host imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk
Username: ******
Password: ******

Cd to your directory which is \aspwork\stefan

Or by mapping a drive from within the IMD lab:-

Open My Computer or Windows Explorer
Choose Tools, Map Network Drive
In the Folder box enter: \\imdasp\aspwork\stefan
Uncheck the Reconnect at logon box
Click connect using a different username
You will be prompted for above username and password
Click Finish
Your directory should appear under the drive letter
To log off, right click your directory and select Disconnect.

2. Changing the password

It is recommended that you change your password as soon as possible for
this account. You can do this from within the IMD lab as follows:-

Ctl-Alt-Del, Change Password, highlight imdasp, and enter required
password details.

3. Making a database writeable from the web

If you are writing ASPs that accept user data from a web page and write
it to a database, you will need to make that database writeable over the
web. You can do this as follows within the IMD lab:-

Highlight your database file
Right click it and choose Properties
Select the Security tab
Click Add
In the Select Users or Groups window scroll the list of users presented
select IUSR_IMDFILE click Add, and OK
In the Properties Security window, select Internet Guest
Account(IMDASP\IUSR_IMDFILE)
Tick the Write box and OK it

4. Using a DSN-less connection

If you are using a DSN-less connection to a database, you will need to
enter the full path to the database. It will be:
D:\aspwork\keag\<your_database_path>

5. Viewing your work

To view your work over the web, your address will be:-
http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/

Please use this web site for ASP work only - there is not enough space
on the server to store large web sites for each student.

Regards,


----------------------------------------------------------

----------------------------------------------------------

[loydall]

All good stuff,

Right - next stage is to build your database and set up a test page to see that your conection is working. There's a bit of script below that should do the job although it may not for various reasons again but I think it's a good place to start. I'm also asuming a number of things:

1: You have built a database called data.mdb
2: You have saved it in the D:\aspwork\keag\ directory
3: You have a table called people
4: You have a column called Name
5: You have at least one record in your database (just enter some random data)

Open up that test file you did earlier and replace what's in it with:

<%

set dj = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset")


dj.ActiveConnection = "DRIVER={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)};DBQ=D:\aspwork\keag\data.mdb"


dj.Source = "SELECT * FROM people"

dj.Open()

response.write (dj.Fields.Item("Name").Value)

%>


BTW - in case it's not clear the second line starting dj.Active ect.. is all one line as far as - ...\data.mdb"

You can split it over several lines using an underscore but dont worry about that for now.

Notice the path to your database in the second line? Change that if required - it should make sense to you.

Save it and open it:

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/test.asp

If you see the name of person in the first record of your database on the screen - Huraahh. If you don't and you get an error message - Booooo. If you do - post the error message here and I'll have a look for you.

[slinky2000]

sorry its takin me a while, i havnt been near a computer over the weekend,

anyway

ive got the database called data and a table called people and a colum called Name


when i open my aspwork folder theres no Keag folder so i made my own and the database is in in,


i careated an asp file with the code:

<%

set dj = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset")


dj.ActiveConnection = "DRIVER={Microsoft Access Driver (*.mdb)};DBQ=D:\aspwork\keag\data.mdb"


dj.Source = "SELECT * FROM people"

dj.Open()

response.write (dj.Fields.Item("Name").Value)

%>



but it comes up no page found? any ideas?

[slinky2000]

and saved it as :

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/test.asp


but the old one :

http://imdasp.infj.ulst.ac.uk/stefan/test_1.asp is still working

[loydall]

Ah.

It has found the page but there's an error message. Unfortunately your uni system is set up to just say that there's an error and not what the error is so it's difficult to say exactly what the problem is although there's not loads of things that can be going wrong here so we're not really in trouble yet.

It will definately be the connection string that's causing this.

Try this instead:

<%

set dj = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset")


strconn="PROVIDER=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;DATA SOURCE="
strconn=strconn & server.mappath("data.mdb") & ";"


dj.ActiveConnection = strconn

dj.Source = "SELECT * FROM people"

dj.Open()

response.write (dj.Fields.Item("Name").Value)

%>

Also, there may be some sort of permissions thing going on so it's worth doing what your IT guy said:

Highlight your database file
Right click it and choose Properties
Select the Security tab
Click Add
In the Select Users or Groups window scroll the list of users presented
select IUSR_IMDFILE click Add, and OK
In the Properties Security window, select Internet Guest
Account(IMDASP\IUSR_IMDFILE)
Tick the Write box and OK it

Although we're not writing to the database at the moment, it might be worth doing this all the same.

[slinky2000]

woohoo mate, it worked! happy days!

i took it out of the keag folder i made and just put in in the same folder as test.asp.


happy days!

[loydall]

Cool

That's the hardest bit done I rekon - if you know your flash stuff anyway.

What you need to do now is decide what data you will need to generate the links/buttons in your flash file. I presume you'll only need the name in the button and then all the other info when the user clicks the button?

Actually, you'll probably need 2 bits of info - the Name and also the ID of each record so you know which record to open in full when the button is clicked.

What you need is to do a bit of work on that page you just got working so that it displays all the names in your database along with their ID's. There's a number of ways of displaying data in asp and grabbing it in flash but the way I like to do it is just have the asp file write out all data seperated by some sort of character eg:


bob*pete*dave*carl etc.... using * as the seperator

What you can do is write out the name then a * then the ID then a * and so on. You'll also need to name this string as a variable so your final output will be:


data=bob*1*pete*2*dave*3*carl*4*....etc.....

you'll then need to load that variable in flash (easy for you yeah?)

and split it at every * to create a nice big array from the data.

Whoooaaaaa - first things first. Build your page that displays your data.

You want a hand with that?

[slinky2000]

i can build the page first, or if you make a simple one i can modify it later on, cos i havtn finalised a design yet for the site,

basically a bit like this (very simple) (attached)


im hop[in it'll be a bit like tyhis when finished:

http://ijsr32.infj.ulst.ac.uk/~10214...ayout_5.1.html

[justplainsoccer]

This thread is great! Im connected! I owe you a virtual beer. But here's a donut


Thanks!

[loydall]

Mmmmm donut.

Right - onwards and upwards. Looping through your recordset and displaying them in a formatted way. This is as basic as it comes for this sort of thing so perhaps isn't the best code you'll see but it will do the job. It's basically the file that you've already got but we're looping through all the records in the database, writing out the name and ID and seperating them with a *.

You may need to change the connection string bit to whatever you've got working at the mo:


<%

set dj = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset")

strconn="PROVIDER=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;DATA SOURCE="
strconn=strconn & server.mappath("data.mdb") & ";"


dj.ActiveConnection = strconn


dj.Source = "SELECT * FROM people"

dj.Open()

response.write "data="

while not (dj.eof)

response.write (dj.Fields.Item("Name").Value)

response.write "*"

response.write (dj.fields.Item("ID").Value)

response.write "*"

dj.movenext

wend

%>

[justplainsoccer]

So how do I write to a database from ASP?

[loydall]

Right, well then,

Lets say you've got a similar set up to the database we're already using - data.mdb with a table called people with columns called Name and Age - for example. Lets say you have a form on one page of your site that collects data from users. There are two text fields in your form called Name and Age. You also have a submit button and the form posts to another page called, for example, two.asp.


in that page you'd have the code:

<%

Name = request.form ("name")
Age = request.form ("age")


strconn="PROVIDER=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;DATA SOURCE="
strconn=strconn & server.mappath("data.mdb") & ";"


strSQL = "INSERT INTO people(Name, age) "
strSQL = strSQL & "Values('" & Name & "', '" & age & "')"


set conn = server.createobject("ADODB.Connection")
conn.open strconn

conn.execute(strSQL)

conn.close
set conn = nothing

response.write "thanks for your info"

%>

That reminds me of something I forgot to mention that is very important - always close your connection to the database after you're done (the conn.close bit). You should also always define your variables before you use them e.g 'dim name,age, strSQL...' not essential but good practice, especially later on when you're debugging and you use option explicit which forces you to define them but helps you find any errors.. Anyway enough of that.


You can also grab data from a flash form in exactly the same way although you may need to use 'request.querystring' instead of 'request.form' if the data from the form is being appended to the url of two.asp (in this case it would look something like: www.yoursite.com/two.asp?name=bob&age=10 )


Get it ???




edit: dont click on that link BTW - I forgot that there might be a yoursite.com.... unless you want a new credit card that is...

[justplainsoccer]

in this part

strSQL = strSQL & "Values('" & Name & "', '" & age & "')"

Why do you have a single quote then double?