How to create a user following php script?

Question

What i am trying to do is to add a user following system (twitter like) to my script.

This is how the db structure looks like:

CREATE TABLE IF NOT EXISTS `user_follow` (
  `id` int(11) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT,
  `follower` int(11) NOT NULL,
  `following` int(11) NOT NULL,
  `subscribed` TIMESTAMP DEFAULT CURRENT_TIMESTAMP,
  PRIMARY KEY (`id`),
  UNIQUE KEY `follow_unique` (`follower`,`following`)
) ENGINE=MyISAM  DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1 ;

If i want create i should use this code:

mysql_query(" INSERT INTO `user_follow` (`follower`, `following`, `subscribed`) VALUES ('$follower', '$following', CURRENT_TIMESTAMP); ");

For the unsubscribe it should look like this:

mysql_query(" DELETE FROM `user_follow` WHERE `follower` = '$follower' AND `following` = '$following'; ");

.

$follower = $_SESSION[user_id]; // the user_id for the one who is currently logged id 
$following = $user_id; // the user_id for the user profile where the script will be on

On the profile page i have a form like this:

<?php if (isset($_SESSION[user_id]) && $_SESSION[user_id] != $user_id) { ?>
<form action="" method="post">
<input name="action" type="hidden" value="<?php echo $subscribe_status; ?>"/>
<button name="subject" type="submit" value="<?php echo $subscribe_text.' '.$username; ?>"><?php echo $subscribe_text.' '.$username; ?></button>
</form>
<?php } ?>

What i don't know is how to link all of those codes...

EDIT:

$subscribe_status should change to follow or unfollow depending if the user is already following that user or not (by checking with a query i think).

Also $subscribe_text should be Follow or Unfollow depending if the currently logged in user ($follower) is already following that user or not.

Can anybody help me please?

EDIT 2 (based on Mihir Singh's answer)

$user_follow = dbquery(" SELECT * FROM `user_follow` WHERE `follower` = '$follower' AND `following` = '$following'; ");
$check_status = dbrows($user_follow);

$sub = false; //Boolean var which states if subscribed or not

if ( $check_status !== 0 ){ //Pseudo code
    $sub = true; //If row is found, they are subscribed, so set $sub to true
}

if($sub){
     $subscribe_status = "follow";
     $subscribe_text = "Follow";
}

else{
     $subscribe_status = "unfollow";
     $subscribe_text = "Unfollow";
}

thank you. i am already know about mysql_real_escape_string and so on... — m3tsys
– m3tsys, Commented May 10, 2012 at 22:16
Sorry, that's my instinctive answer when I see something like mysql_query(" DELETE FROM `user_follow` WHERE `follower` = '$follower' AND `following` = '$following'; "); — Amadan
– Amadan, Commented May 10, 2012 at 22:18
Okay. Now what exactly is the question? How to find out what $subscribe_text is, or...? I really can't tell. It seems you have all you need. — Amadan
– Amadan, Commented May 10, 2012 at 22:35
Please don't use mysql_* functions in new code. They were removed from PHP 7.0.0 in 2015. Instead, use prepared statements via PDO or MySQLi. See Why shouldn't I use mysql_* functions in PHP? for more information. — orourkek
– orourkek, Commented May 10, 2012 at 23:01

citruspi · Accepted Answer · 2012-05-11 19:03:24Z

2

Here's some code:

$sub = false; //Boolean var which states if subscribed or not

if (row in table exists --> subscribed ){ //Pseudo code
    $sub = true; //If row is found, they are subscribed, so set $sub to true

if($sub){
     $subscribe_status = "Follow";
     $subscribe_text = "Unfollow";
}

else{
     $subscribe_status = "Unfollow";
     $subscribe_text = "Follow";
}

EDIT:

So, this is the form code that you're using:

<?php if (isset($_SESSION[user_id]) && $_SESSION[user_id] != $user_id) { ?>
<form action="" method="post">
<input name="action" type="hidden" value="<?php echo $subscribe_status; ?>"/>
<button name="subject" type="submit" value="<?php echo $subscribe_text.' '.$username; ?>">       
<?php echo $subscribe_text.' '.$username; ?></button>
</form>
<?php } ?>

Based on that, I would change

<form action="" method="post">

to

<form action="handler.php" method="post">

and then create a handler file with this:

<?
    if ($_POST['action'] == "Follow")
        //Perform Unfollow Query to Database
    else
        //Perform Follow Query to Database
?>

That's barebones.... but it should work out. How's that?

edited May 11, 2012 at 19:03

answered May 10, 2012 at 23:26

citruspi

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4 Comments

m3tsys Over a year ago

thank you, i used this code but how should i add the query to update (follow or unfollow) to the code?

citruspi Over a year ago

@m3tsys I'll append it in a moment.

citruspi Over a year ago

@m3tsys the new code has been appended. Tell me what you think.

m3tsys Over a year ago

thank you very much for your time. i had to modify the code like following because if i used your example at a simple refresh of the page a unfollow was made if ($_POST['action'] == "follow"){/* follow query */} elseif ($_POST['action'] == "unfollow"){/* unfollow query */} i basically added a else if condition. thank you again.

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