Dynmaic Drop-Down List

The Problem: A video accessories company had a large list of video camera data(over 500) for their compatibility list.  They had a manual system of adding new cameras to an html dropdown list.  The current system made it difficult to update and it was prone to innaccuracies.

The Solution: I created a MySQL database with an administator interface on the backend and utilizing php and Javascript, I created a Dynamicly generated Drop-down list for the user interface.

Here is a sample of the code:

<?php
///////// Getting the data from Mysql table for first list box//////////
$quer2=mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT MakeName, MakeID FROM CameraMake order by MakeID");
///////////// End of query for first list box////////////

/////// for second drop down list we will check if category is selected else we will display all the subcategory/////
//$cat=$_GET['cat']; // This line is added to take care if your global variable is off
if(isset($cat) and strlen($cat) > 0){
$quer=mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT ModelName,ProductID FROM CameraModel where MakeID=$cat order by ModelName");
}else{$quer=mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT ModelName,ProductID FROM CameraModel order by ModelName"); }
////////// end of query for second subcategory drop down list box ///////////////////////////

echo "<form method=post name=f1>";
////////// Starting of first drop downlist /////////
echo "<select name='cat' onchange=\"reload(this.form)\"><option value=''>-Camera Make-</option>";
while($noticia2 = mysql_fetch_array($quer2)) {
if($noticia2['MakeID']==@$cat){echo "<option selected value='$noticia2[MakeID]'>$noticia2[MakeName]</option>"."<BR>";}
else{echo  "<option value='$noticia2[MakeID]'>$noticia2[MakeName]</option>";}
}
echo "</select>";
//////////////////  This will end the first drop down list ///////////
echo "<br>";
echo "<br>";
////////// Starting of second drop downlist /////////
echo "<select name='subcat' onchange=\"reload3(this.form)\"><option value=''>-Camera Model-</option>";
while($noticia = mysql_fetch_array($quer)) {
if($noticia['ProductID']==@$cat3){echo "<option value='$noticia[ProductID]'>$noticia[ModelName]</option>"."<BR>";}
else{echo  "<option value='$noticia[ProductID]'>$noticia[ModelName]</option>";}
}
echo "</select>";
echo "</form>";
?>