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General PHP Help
#23

I also downloaded that Pickem code. It was unfinished in my humble opinion. It has very little for documentation. BUT, it has a ton of really nice features that I have upgraded and I have a working version of it going now for testing.

I added in a background image to fill that awful dull plain background which made it much more impression. I changed the make-your-picks page include a tie-breaker on the Monday night game and smoothed out some of the other issues like entering games. Replaced having to type in the time the game starts using a simple drop-down for the possible times NFL start at and other minor things. But, so far, the code is very stable and works great. (Although, I did not use their .htaccess as it crashed the site!)

Let me know if you decide to use it and if you need help with issues on it. I know it quite well nowā€¦

Good luck!

#24

@ErnieAlex
I wasnā€™t going to say anything but since you brought it upā€¦

I did read through the Pickem Code after you posted the link and saw issues with the code as well.

#25

Yes, it had little protection code and so little comments, that it might be hard for a beginner to manage or rewrite. But, I did feel it ended up with a nice simple display. Especially when you put in a background image and fixed up some of the CSS code. The database code covers most things that happen, but are hard to add in things. Its a good start though for free!

#26

LOL

Wow! Here I am, a guppy with PHP and you guys seem to be flying through the code.

First, I think Pickem is going to be the best solution for me. I used PHPFootball as a source for the participantsā€™ picks. Then ran an SQL statement and downloaded the results into a spreadsheet. Other spreadsheets for accumulating the players (participants) results through the course of the season. I know if there is a table with picks I can get what I need.

I understand the situation. Youā€™ve been working with PHP long enough that you are fluent. What gets me laughing is that I started my coding career in 1980. In the first 20 years I was developing ERP solutions for a couple of manufacturing companies. I had to learn a different language and database for each and after a while I was fluent. Likewise with the next two companies I worked for - new language and database. At least both were SQL based. I am back to being a guppy coder with PHP. :slight_smile:

I spent only about 6 hours this weekend looking at Pickem code. (Still dealing with moving in tasks). Not much progress. Created a db on the hosting site, researched the values for the vars in the config.php. By the way, I have not figured out the value for SITE_URL. And finally, it took me a while to figure out the reference about ā€œrunning the installerā€ was the index.php. At least, I think that is it.

So, here I am, finally sitting down to make some progress tonight. And, I see your post.

Yes! I would love to use your enhancements! How do we proceed?

Ed

P.S. FYI - An example of a few tweaks I could do in phpā€¦ In PHPFootball the layout for picking the games placed the radio buttons on the outside and the teams in the middle:
O NY Jets Buffalo O
I changed the code so the radio buttons are on the inside; easier for people to proof their picks:
NY Jets O O Buffalo

#27

Yikes! Well, first, the Pickem code has just about all you need in it. I just added a combined-score to the last game on Monday nights so players could enter that so I could use it for picking just one winner. Cuts down on sharing wins with five people as it happens sometime. I am planning on having the closet to the combined score win. So, if one is one lower and one is one higher than the actual combined score, they would split. Splitting with a couple is fine, just many is an issue.

Also, it is really boring looking to me as-is. So, I added some really simple code to make a football image go behind everything and it makes the entire site jump out. Of course I removed all the donate buttons. I plan to donate some to the original author, but, canā€™t locate him except in that paypal button. Which donates not to him, but, some company. Not going to do that.

A lot of his code was not documented, but, I got it working quite well. Now, I guess the next thing to ask is what do you want to add into it first? Security wise, you might want to start with filtering the inputs from the forms. You really shouldnā€™t just use $variable = $_POST[ā€œsome-fieldā€]; as it is not safe. You could just start using the filter_input() functions to start with. Also, if this is a private site you are building, you might want to remove the ā€œregister-hereā€ line on the login page. Otherwise you will have people you donā€™t know registering. If you want help adding a background picture, it is easy to do. It makes a huge difference in how the site looks! It is quite nice in general and well thought out. The count-down timers are way-cool. They count down from for the next game and for the next weekā€™s lock-out time. I liked them a lot. The TAUNT or comment part is nice, too. Has some trouble getting the schedule-edit to work, but, seems to work well if everything is set up. A bit tedious to enter all the games, one game at a time. But, you only do it once, so not a big deal.

Well, ask your questionsā€¦ I hope you used the installer to set it up as it asks you for the DOMAIN-URL and sets it up in a lot of placesā€¦

#28

First, have not installed yet. Not with unanswered questions, i.eā€¦ SITE-URL

SITE-URLā€¦ Exactly what is the value represent? For example, my domain is edassenheimer.com. I want the Pickem Pool to be in a sub-directory, for example: edassenheimer.com/myfootballpool/pickemstuff
Would I use that last URL?

Is the Tie-Breaker an optional feature? My pool has 64 players split into 4 groups of 16 competing against each other. (Now you can understand my downloading the picks and importing them into Excel. We do not have tie breakers. We can ignore entering the tie breaker. And, yes, there are some weeks with ties; the max has been 7. We donā€™t mind it. The big prizes are best season average, best amateur (the person with the most correct picks and never wins a weekly pot - hence, an amateur), and some other prizes.

Register Hereā€¦ I recall that I commented that out in the menu.

Loading the season scheduleā€¦
The previous one had code to install from a text file. I know that I can import the data.

I hope to get to work on this some this evening. Will try to install.

Life would have been easier if I had not decided to move. But then, we wouldnā€™t be here now because I would have had the time to learn PHP and modify the code. I am excited about how this has turned out. I little pressure getting it up and running, but, that makes life fun.

Will post back this evening.

Thanks!!!

Ed

#29

Well, first the site-url is created when you use the install feature. Remember this is a template that you are using. It is set up with an INSTALL folder. All you need to do is make a connection to your SQL server in the config file. Once that is done, you run the install setup. This asks you what your siteā€™s URL is. Once you enter that, it saves it. And, then, this is used throughout the site. You donā€™t have to be bothered with it. Since the site is badly commented and does not use much security, I have not donated to the author as yet. He put in absolutely no security on inputs. You should change the queries to use prepared statements. Or PDO. These are much more secured than just using $_POST variables directly.

Now, comments on your usage. The entire site is data driven, meaning that everything is held in the database. So, there is no need for text imports or whatever. You can do direct updates to the database if needed with Excel sheets converted to CSV formats and upload them on your server. But, the site comes with a game entry page in the ADMINā€™s section. It uses drop-downs for teams, you enter the date and time. I altered the timing system as it was a pain to keep typing it in. I replaced it with a simple drop-down holding all of the possible start times for the NFL. Then, it is easy to pick the starting time. So, I just need to enter the game day and use the three drop-downs to pick time and teams. Works great.

Of course, I also removed the donation buttons from the site. As my players do not need to contribute to me. They already are paying an entry fee to join the group. Not sure how you would handle the 4 groups of 16 when totaling winners. Just logic code, so I am sure you could sort it out once all the rest is working.

Ask any further questions. Might have an answer for youā€¦ Good luck with it allā€¦

#30

Would anyone be willing to share a working code for this. I am not too familiar with php and would be so grateful if I can modify a working script with my site info.

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