transition screens

[OneSolution]

When you use Orbitz or Hotwire, and you execute a search, a nice screen with
adverts pops up while the search is conducted, and then you are taken to the
results page.

How would you do that in PHP and ASP? I need both as I want to use it in
two projects.

thanks a lot,
Z

[duz]

"OneSolution" <onesolution@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message news:<cU50d.18109$v13.7818@newssvr24.news.prodigy. com>...

> When you use Orbitz or Hotwire, and you execute a search, a nice screen with
> adverts pops up while the search is conducted, and then you are taken to the
> results page.
>
> How would you do that in PHP and ASP? I need both as I want to use it in
> two projects.
>
> thanks a lot,
> Z

Use META HTTP-EQUIV=Refresh to do it. No PHP needed unless you wanted
to get fancier.

Ben
[url]http://www.daq5studios.com[/url]

[OneSolution]

Hi Guys,

I'm not sure if that'll do the trick. Let me elaborate.

A search may take up to 1 minute to run, which is a really long time and I
am working on reducing it. But for now, I have to deal with it.

So while my client is waiting for the search to complete, I want a
percentage ticker or some animation to indicate to the client that the
system hasn't hung, and in fact is searching.

So if you look on hotwire, or priceline, or any other site, while their
search is being conducted, they display an animation screen saying,
"Searching ... ", and that page refreshes quite constantly.

As soon as the search has finished, it shows the results.

If I used a META refresh tag, then each time the page re-loads, the search
will restart. That's quite useless. I want the search to start, and
continue while the displayed page indicates that the search is in process.

If I used Java, I could spawn a thread and run the search on that thread
while the main thread uses a keep-alive request to talk to the browser, and
when the search thread has completed, display the results.

In ASP and PHP, how would I do something similar?

I am currently exploring (in ASP) the server.transfer method. Here's the
way I figure it.

When the user clicks on the search button, I show them a page with some
animated GIF to keep their attention. In the mean time, I do a backend
server.transfer to an ASP script that executes the search. Since the search
is time consuming, I do the response.buffer=true. This way, the user's
browser window will show the last page displayed until the new page is good
and ready to be displayed. The last page displayed is the one with the
stupid animated GIF saying "searching ... ". So when the ASP that is doing
the search is done, it'll show the results.

Whaddaya think? Is there a better way to do it?

Thanks,
Z


"OneSolution" <onesolution@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message
news:cU50d.18109$v13.7818@newssvr24.news.prodigy.c om...

> When you use Orbitz or Hotwire, and you execute a search, a nice screen
> with adverts pops up while the search is conducted, and then you are taken
> to the results page.
>
> How would you do that in PHP and ASP? I need both as I want to use it in
> two projects.
>
> thanks a lot,
> Z
>

[OneSolution]

Yea, in MySQL, the LIMIT keyword is great. That's what I plan on doing
there. In the ASP side of it, especially with Access, it really sucks.
Unfortunately, I have to build my prototype in Access to demonstrate the
functionality.


<Michael Vilain <vilain@spamcop.net>> wrote in message
news:vilain-2F9F4A.00501513092004@comcast.dca.giganews.com...

> In article <2A31d.19327$bP2.5562@newssvr24.news.prodigy.com >,
> "OneSolution" <onesolution@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
>

>> Hi Guys,
>>
>> I'm not sure if that'll do the trick. Let me elaborate.
>>
>> A search may take up to 1 minute to run, which is a really long time and
>> I
>> am working on reducing it. But for now, I have to deal with it.
>>
>> So while my client is waiting for the search to complete, I want a
>> percentage ticker or some animation to indicate to the client that the
>> system hasn't hung, and in fact is searching.
>>
>> So if you look on hotwire, or priceline, or any other site, while their
>> search is being conducted, they display an animation screen saying,
>> "Searching ... ", and that page refreshes quite constantly.
>>
>> As soon as the search has finished, it shows the results.
>>
>> If I used a META refresh tag, then each time the page re-loads, the
>> search
>> will restart. That's quite useless. I want the search to start, and
>> continue while the displayed page indicates that the search is in
>> process.
>>
>> If I used Java, I could spawn a thread and run the search on that thread
>> while the main thread uses a keep-alive request to talk to the browser,
>> and
>> when the search thread has completed, display the results.
>>
>> In ASP and PHP, how would I do something similar?
>>
>> I am currently exploring (in ASP) the server.transfer method. Here's the
>> way I figure it.
>>
>> When the user clicks on the search button, I show them a page with some
>> animated GIF to keep their attention. In the mean time, I do a backend
>> server.transfer to an ASP script that executes the search. Since the
>> search
>> is time consuming, I do the response.buffer=true. This way, the user's
>> browser window will show the last page displayed until the new page is
>> good
>> and ready to be displayed. The last page displayed is the one with the
>> stupid animated GIF saying "searching ... ". So when the ASP that is
>> doing
>> the search is done, it'll show the results.
>>
>> Whaddaya think? Is there a better way to do it?

>
> The browser needs to be doing the animation while the server is busy
> doing the database load. So your form collects the information and
> sends a page to the browser. That page runs a Javascript animation or
> Java applet or displays an animated GIF for a "please wait" message.
> When the query completes, it sends it's output to the browser.
>
> The key problem is that the web server makes the request of the database
> via php. There's no progress information communicated back from MySQL
> to Apache, so there's no way to report it to the client browser. So,
> unless you want to 'do your own thing' and not bother with Apache, php,
> or MySQL, you're out of luck with this approach.
>
> I doubt you could do anything like a progress bar that's in any way
> meaningful as you have no way to obtain true progress information from
> the server while the search is going on. You could write your own Java
> servlet that does the lookup and reports % complete to a corresponding
> Java applet that you download to the browser. But this sidesteps PHP
> and web pages for your own home-grown stuff. Seems like a very large
> investment for very little return.
>
> I'd work on fixing the query to return less results using LIMIT or
> fixing the tables being queried so that they don't do full table scans
> (e.g. add indexes on fields being queried).
>
> --
> DeeDee, don't press that button! DeeDee! NO! Dee...
>
>
>