PHP Image gallery array

Question

Hi,

Somebody asked me to created a PHP image gallery that will read the images out of a directory and then create thumbnails for the gallery. There is one directory with thumnails, and one directory with fullsize images.

I read the file names out of the /thumb/ directory and insert each file name as a value into the thumbArray. From there I echo out the values in thumbnail src (<img src="<?php echo $thumbArray[$i]; ?>" />) where $i is just a counter. So the thumbnail images are produced from the array but when you click on the thumbnail, it queries ?filename into the url. Using $_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'] I then read said query string and insert the query, (filename), into the the large <img src"<?php echo $_SERVER['QUERY_STRING']; ?>" />. That is limited though. As I can now not read the array, as a reference point, and can no longer point forwards or backwards in the array.

Am I making more sense now?

Please help...

    <?php 
 $i = 0;

 /* Large file name and thumbnail file name must match */
 /* Large image size = 480px x 300px */
 echo '<img class="frameImg" src="images/large/'.$_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'].'" />';

 ?>
    <p id="prevNext"><a href="#">&lt;&lt; Prev </a> || <a href="#"> Next &gt;&gt;</a></p>
  </div>
  <div id="thumbs">
    <ul>
     <?php
 /* Must change $dir to the full path of directory all the way from root /home/user/domain/images/thumb */
 $dir = "*************************";
 $dh = opendir($dir);

 /* Thumbnail file name and large file name must match */
 $thumbArray = array();
 while (($file = readdir($dh)) !== false) {
  if ($file != "." && $file != "..") {
   $thumbArray[$i]=$file;
   echo '<li id="'.$i.'"><a href="?'.$thumbArray[$i].'"><img src="images/thumb/'.$thumbArray[$i].'" alt="Alt for '.$thumbArray[$i].'" /></a></li>';
   $i++;
  }
 }
 closedir($dh);
 ?>

http://client.clogg.ca/janelle-nadeau/gallery.php

Answer 1

I'm not quite sure if I understand.

If the large images are shown based on the URL of the thumb nails, then only large images will show that have a corresponding thumb nail URL in you list. No thumb nail, no large. Correct?

Answer 2

if i understand you correctly you just need to select the next and prev values from your $thumbArray[$i] Array.

eg.

$prevThumb = $thumbArray[($i-1)];
$nextThumb = $thumbArray[($i+1)];

of course for first and last you must take extra care. (and checking the existent of the element)

---

EDIT: ok i understand.

Rearange your code. you have to read your directory on every page. so why not read it at top of your code into an array, and loop through this array to build the thumbnail list.

for the prev/next buttons you can now use the index from your already build array to find the filename for the prev/next image.

did i make myself understandble ?