How to read a folder on the server?

[kargrafx]

I'd like to make a dynamic photo gallery that bypasses XML; so the website owner can just upload folders/images to a directory, and not bother updating an xml file.

I think PHP could be one way to do this, is it the best? Could Flash do it without a serverside script, just AS?

Basically, I would like the script (AS, PHP, whatever) to look in a directory, let's call it "gallery/". Any folders in that directory become categories in the gallery (drop-down or combo box or something is populated with the folder/category names). Any images in those folders are automatically made into thumbnails, and displayed when that category is selected. Can be a manual gallery, a slideshow, or whatever. I'll work on that later.

Is PHP my best answer?

Thanks!

[nunomira]

hi,

PHP is a good solution.
A simple script such as

<?php
//path to directory
$directory = './images/';
 
//get all image files with a .jpg, .jpeg, .png or .gif extension
$images = glob("$directory{*.gif,*.jpg,*.jpeg,*.png}", GLOB_BRACE);

// view the array with the images' names
print_r($images);
?>

does what you want.

After having the images in an array, you can still generate an xml file dynamically.