Re: Editing Entries In A Flat Database

Some comments:

Use CGI.pm. It turns this:

 print "    <td align=center>\n";
  print "     <input type=submit value=\"Process Information\">\n";
  print "     <input type=reset value=\"Clear Form\">\n";
  print "    </td>\n";
[download]

into this:

 print td( {-align=>'center'},
           submit( -value=>'Process Information'),
           reset( -value=>'Clear Form') ), "\n";
[download]

Instead of print statements on every line, try using a HERE document. You no longer have to explicitly insert \n characters or escape the embedded quotes, among other readability advantages:
```
  print <<"END_HTML";
<HTML>
  <HEAD>
    <TITLE>Document Title</TITLE>
  </HEAD>
  <BODY>
   Hello, World!
  </BODY>
</HTML>
END_HTML
[download]
```
Once you get used to it, it's a much cleaner (and more efficient -- one call to print() rather than fifty -- way to express large amounts of literal text.
Try to separate your presentation code (HTML output) from your business logic (database code). It's more than a little difficult to see what's actually going on here, much less what you are trying to do.

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Re: Editing Entries In A Flat Database by impossiblerobot (Deacon) on Dec 28, 2001 at 20:33 UTC
It seems to me that everytime someone advocates using CGI.pm for HTML generation, they give examples that show (IMHO) no advantage over printing HTML in a 'heredoc'. I have found many cases where CGI.pm HTML functions are very useful (such as generating checkbox groups from data), but in cases like this, I find the HTML more readable. Impossible Robot	[reply]
Re: Re: Re: Editing Entries In A Flat Database by IlyaM (Parson) on Dec 28, 2001 at 23:08 UTC
IMHO there should be no HTML in Perl code at all. Neither in form of heredocs nor in form of CGI.pm method calls. Use templates! -- Ilya Martynov (http://martynov.org/)	[reply]
Re(3): Editing Entries In A Flat Database by dmmiller2k (Chaplain) on Dec 28, 2001 at 20:58 UTC
Perhaps you're right. That was a bad example. One way CGI.pm shows its usefulness which seems to been obscured here is with deeply nested constructs (table within a table within a form, etc.). By replacing the BEGIN/END (tag) paradigm with a nested function call paradigm, CGI all but eliminates the kind of unbalanced tag nuisances one frequently encounters when generating HTML dynamically. IMHO, I find looking at naked HTML (in a HEREDOC or otherwise) annoying for its waste of space (I suppose XML rubs me much the same way) and its near-redundancy; I dislike typing it even more. I suppose the advantage is better illustrated with this comparison: `<FORM METHOD='POST> <INPUT TYPE="hidden" NAME="mode" VALUE="confirm"> <TABLE BORDER=0> <TR> <TD> <TABLE WIDTH='100%'> <TR> <TH>ColA</TH> <TH>ColB</TH> <TH>ColC</TH> </TR> <TR> <TD>Value A</TD> <TD>Value B</TD> <TD>Value C</TD> </TR> <TR> <TD><INPUT TYPE="submit"></TD> <TD><INPUT TYPE="reset"</TD> <TD> </TD> </TR> </TABLE> </TD> </TR> </TABLE> </FORM>` [download] Compared with: `form( { -method => 'POST' }, hidden( -name => 'mode', -value => 'confirm' ), table( { -border => 0 }, Tr( td( table( { -width => '100%' }, Tr( th( [ 'ColA','ColB','ColC' ] ), td( [ 'Value A','Value B','Value C' +] ) td( [ submit, reset, ' ' ] )) ))) ) )` [download] Oh, you want to write all that to the browser? `print form( { -method => 'POST' }, hidden( -name => 'mode', -value => 'confirm' ), table( { -border => 0 }, Tr( td( table( { -width => '100%' }, Tr( th( [ 'ColA','ColB','ColC' ] ), td( [ 'Value A','Value B','Value C' +] ) td( [ submit, reset, ' ' ] )) ))) ) )` [download] dmm You can give a man a fish and feed him for a day ... Or, you can teach him to fish and feed him for a lifetime	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re (tilly) 4: Editing Entries In A Flat Database by tilly (Archbishop) on Jan 05, 2002 at 19:31 UTC
For any complex website I would strongly disagree with the advice to use CGI's html generation methods. The more complex the overall site, the more I tend to disagree. A recent node with a good summary of why templating is a good idea was given by maverick at Re: Re: Re: Re: Code Critique. (There are plenty of others out there of course.)	[reply]
Re (tilly) 5: Editing Entries In A Flat Database by dmmiller2k (Chaplain) on Jan 06, 2002 at 08:44 UTC