Hello,

Do you need to use php to save text entered from an input field into an XML
file?

I'd like to create a bunch of input boxes that "onRelease" of the save button
saves each
input into a specific order in an XML file so I can later call the file again
and the childNodes would stay consistant each time I save.

example:

fName = myXML.firstChild.childNodes[ i ].firstchild.nodeValue

this way I can continue to populate my XML file from inside a flash
application.
possible without php? guidance welcome.

thanks,

sky

[quoted text, click to view]
file?
Yes, or some other third party.

However, it kind of sounds like you don't need to change the XML outside of
Flash? If that is the case, then yes, you can just change the existing nodes on
you XML object. That will stay consistent within Flash, but it won't change the
original file--meaning if you reload(which will happen if you close and
re-open) you're back where you started.

One alternative, depending on what your goal is, is to use the SharedObject to
store local data for individual users. Other users(including you) can't access
that data, of course, since its stored locally on the users machine, but it
does provide a nice way to remember a user's experience across sessions.

HTH

I'm actually trying to save the file onto the server like an update.
Scenario:

you want to post something to my site. you fill out the form then hit send.
then some code.... I don't know which... php, flash AS ??? will then add it
to the "posted.xml" file on the server.

I see that you can do this with php add to it using post. But I'm lost when it
comes to posting input text from flash into an XML file on the server.
on top of that I want each input field that is filled out to have a certain
childNodes
inside the "posted.xml" so that when anybody references the post it fills out
the form and puts the first name in the name spot and the last name in the last
name dynamic text box.

example:

<family>
<person>
<fname>tom</fname> // [ 0 ] [ 0 ]
<lname>clancy</lname> // [ 0 ] [ 1 ] would be the reference for
flash to read
</person>

// here is where the next person to be added to the xml file would go.
<person>.........</person>

// this information would be collected from a form and then saved here in the
xml file on the server.

</family>

I'm just curious as to if this is possible and which scripting language would
work best for this. I'm using it only to retrieve and store elements with
childNodes in the xml file.

any thoughts?

Yes, you will need to use some PHP or some other server-side scripting language.

From the Flash side, you would probably send you variables using the LoadVars
object(assuming you aren't using AS3) via the POST method, and then the PHP
does the actual interpretation and writing to the file.

my_lv = new LoadVars();
my_lv.fname = fname_txt.text;
my_lv.lname = lname_txt.text;
my_lv.sendAndLoad("writeToXML.php", my_lv, "POST");

(check out the docs on LoadVars)

I don't know enough about PHP to give you reliable advice on how to approach
that side of it.

As far as loading the fname/lname, I'm not sure I followed where and how you
would want that information to auto-populate. Would fname/lname be associated
with a computer?

thanks, Abeall.

I'll look into the loadVars for this. The fName and lName would be entered by
a client not a computer name.
You could use it to look up a person in the xml file by first name, last name,
id or what-have-you.
The important things are that it saves to the xml file on the server and in
the order that I want it too. ie( fName is always childNodes [ i ] [ 0 ] and
lName is always saved as childNodes [ i ] [ 1 ] in the xml file.

Thanks for giving me direction. I'll look into the loadVars and I need to
research more on php and how php and xml are linked because if it saves to a
php file and NOT my xml file will flash 8 AS2 still read it like it was an xml
file?

thanks again for the giving me an direction to research.
sky

[quoted text, click to view]

You'll have two files, a PHP file which is basically a middle-man proxy. Since
Flash can't save to an XML file, but PHP can, basically what you are doing is
using LoadVars(or you could actually use the XML class in Flash which has
send/sendAndLoad methods too) to hand off the information to the PHP, then the
PHP actually writes to the file. So you might have 3 files that look like this:

yourXML.xml
saveToXML.php
yourFlash.swf

What you want to do is save information from yourFlash.swf to yourXML.xml.
But, since Flash can't do this, what you have to do is send yourFlash.swf
information to saveToXML.php, which can save, and it will take that information
and immediantly save it to the XML file.

[quoted text, click to view]
I meant to say:
You'll have two files, a PHP file which is basically a middle-man proxy, and
an XML file--in addition to your Flash SWF and HTMLs files, etc.

Here is a small PHP script which is doing exactly what we are talking about.
It takes POST data, opens an XML file, creates a new node with some attributes
based on the POST data, and saves it to back to file. I'm also doing some
checks to make sure the data is not too big or incorrect, to prevent malicious
attempts.

if(count($_POST) == 4
&& strlen($_POST['fname']) <= 50
&& strlen($_POST['lname']) <= 50
&& strlen($_POST['email']) <= 50
&& strlen($_POST['comment']) <= 250){

foreach ($_POST AS $key => $val)
$_POST[$key] = stripslashes($_POST[$key]);

$dom = new DomDocument();
$dom->load("guestbook.xml");
$node = $dom->createElement("comment");
//attr: name
appendChildAttribute($dom,$node,"fname",$_POST['fname']);
//attr: favkind
appendChildAttribute($dom,$node,"lname",$_POST['lname']);
//attr: fav
appendChildAttribute($dom,$node,"email",$_POST['email']);

//append new node
$node->appendChild($dom->createTextNode($_POST['comment']));
$dom->documentElement->appendChild($node);

// Echo the output
//header('Content-type: text/xml');
//echo $dom->saveXML();

// Save to file
$dom->save("guestbook.xml");

}else{
echo "Invalid submission";
}

function appendChildAttribute($dom, $node, $attributeName, $attributeValue){
$attr = $dom->createAttribute($attributeName); //create attribute
$attr->appendChild($dom->createTextNode($attributeValue)); //assign
attribute value
$node->appendChild($attr); //add the attribute to node
}

WOW, ok, I'm definately going to have to chew on this one for a bit. Thank you
for providing me the code. At least now, I can go line by line and figure it
then modify it to my needs.

can you check my brief breakdown on this...

1:
( if statment) // checks to make sure the string length of each $_POST
(variable) so no larger than the number on the right (50, 50, 50 or 250)
correct?

2:
foreach ($_POST AS $key => $val) // don't understand... sets $_POST as a
variable $key? or is $key to fetch a key from an associative array?

3:
$dom = new DomDocument();
// creates new DomDocument
$dom->load("guestbook.xml");
// loads the xml file into it.
$node = $dom->createElement("comment");
// creates an childNodes element within the DomDocument named("comment")
appendChildAttribute($dom,$node,"fname",$_POST['fname']);
// adds an attribute to the dom inside the node "fname" variable

wait a minute... I'm going to need some time to research all this script.

again,
thank you for the help.

sky

thanks so much,

sky