And then filter an XML file based on the values passed from the URL.
If you’re not aware, Adobe now has it’s own AJAX/Javascript library called SPRY for you to use and better yet they include this with Dreamweaver CS3. I assume that you already probably know of or use SPRY.
So lets assume you want to pass in a value via your URL to filter your data set, baring in mind that this will be a destructive filter. So for example your url is mysite.com/index.htm?myFilter=a
And for example your XML file is something like;
<products>
<product name=”a”>description</product>
<product name=”b”>description</product>
</products>
For this to work you need to add in/ include these JavaScript files in your HTML file:
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”xpath.js”></script>
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”SpryData.js”></script>
// These are needed to interface with the XML file
<script type=”text/javascript” src=”SpryURLUtils.js”></script>
// This is whats used to get the values from the URL query string
And this is the code, if you’ve already used SPRY then you’ll understand some of this.
<script type=”text/javascript”>
var params = Spry.Utils.getLocationParamsAsObject();
// This creates an array of the values called params from the URL using the SpryURLUtils.js
var dsStuff = new Spry.Data.XMLDataSet(”<myDirectory>/<myFile>.xml”, “products/product”);
// This creates a new data set from your xml file
if (params.myFilter){
dsStuff.setXPath(”products/product[@name = '"+params.myFilter+"']“);
dsStuff.loadData();
}
// This then adds in a filter to the same data set as previously declared providing that there is a value in the URL for the variable myFilter. It now destructively filters the data set and you can probably add a case to check that the data in the XML exists.
</script>
And now when you make your call to the data set as normal, it will still function, but when a value is passed into the myFilter variable in the URL, it will then filter the data and return only the matching results.
More can be found here from Adobe
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