Implementing paging

What is the best way to implement paging through database results? Say
there are two hyperlinks NEXT and PREV on the page.

I am stumped, would like to know how to proceed from here.

Should a global variable that keeps track of the results page number
be used? What else is required? What if I want to use a POST method
and not a GET? How do I do that?

Any help appreciated!

<nostradumbass77@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:f507a0c3-9c42-4895-b486-1ff2a75d0ae7@s12g2000prg.googlegroups.com...
>
> What is the best way to implement paging through database results? Say
> there are two hyperlinks NEXT and PREV on the page.
>
> I am stumped, would like to know how to proceed from here.
>
> Should a global variable that keeps track of the results page number
> be used? What else is required? What if I want to use a POST method
> and not a GET? How do I do that?
>
> Any help appreciated!

Wow. Okay, first, I'm not a PHP expert, but I have done some pagination.

The best I can think, the way to use POST would be to use a submit button
with a hidden variable value for the "next" link. Or you could use cookies
if you don't mind requiring them.

The only way I've done it is using a GET value to change the WHERE values in
the query . You just need to set some variables: $perpage - Number of
returns per page (which can be a constant or which you can let the user
choose); a GET value; a $pages value for the number of pages; what I call
$batch which determines the number by which to multiply the $perpage to set
the result.

Here's a code snippet to give you an idea of what I did:
$a = ($batch + 1);
$b = $batch + ($limit);
if ($b > $numrows) $b = $numrows;
$pages=ceil($numrows/$limit);

if ($batch>=1) {
$prevbatch=($batch-$limit);
}

$currentpage = (($batch/$limit) + 1);

It's not hard to do in terms of PHP knowledge, but it takes a bit of
ingenuity. It's a bit of fun coding that a non-guru can accomplish.

Another idea would be to hold the values in an array, but you'd have to use
a user-side script to change the displayed values.