Categories and sub categories

I have a couple of questions, please.

Please take a look at the code below and see if you can help me.

I am writing a shopping cart program and my boss decided we need to have a treeview of categories.

The spec says:

If you click a category, it should expand to give you a list of subcategories.

Both categories and subcategories are database fields.

Then if you click on any of the subcategories, it should give you

a bried description of that subcategory field.

If you like it, add it to your cart. If you don't go back to treeview and make another selection.

I could not come with anything easy.

After doing an extensively devouring online resources, I came up with this code.

My two questions are:

1, can you please help make it possible to have more than one subcategory?

So far, I am getting one subcategory per category.

I need to be able to display all the subcategories in the database.

When I go to query analyzer (sql server), all subcategories belonging to a category are displayed.

The second question is, how can I hyperlink the subcategory so it takes me to description page where each category is given a brief description?

A response to any or all of the questions will be greatly appreciated.

If there is a link that can satisfy any or all of the above needs, please let me have that too.

Thanks in advance.

here is the code I have so far:

<form action='treeview.asp' method='post'>
<%

Dim filePath
Dim oConnect
Dim oResult
Dim Racine
Dim Item
Dim catOld
Dim DiscOld

catOld=""
DiscOld=""
Racine=4
Item=0

' ************ Map authors database to physical path

'filePath = Server.MapPath("db1.mdb")

' ************ Create ADO Connection Component to connect with sample database

Set oConnect = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Connection")
oConnect.Open "dsn=scart"

'*************  SQL query for the Category

Set oResult = oConnect.Execute(" select categories.catdescription, products.cname from categories,products where categories.categoryid = products.ccategory order by categories.catdescription " )

do while (Not oResult.eof)

 if oResult("catdescription")<> catOld then
  if catOld <> "" then
   WriteFoot
   WriteFoot
  end if

  '************** Categories **********

  WriteHead "My"&Racine&"TreeView",Item, oResult("catdescription") ,0,True,False,"",False
  catOld=oResult("catdescription")
  Item=Item+1

 

  '************** SubCategories **********

  WriteHead "My"&Racine&"TreeView",Item, oResult("cname") ,1,False,False,"",False
  DiscOld=oResult("cname")
  Item=Item+1

 end if

 Racine=Racine+1
 oResult.MoveNext
loop
WriteFoot
WriteFoot

%>
</form>

example?

catdescription is the category Name, cname is the subcategoryname

and cdescription is the description of the item.

Now given the code snippet above, how will that be coded?

Normally, I would use this syntax to accomplish second question:
               Response.Write "<a href=""treeview.asp?categoryID=" & oResult("categoryID") & """>"
Response.Write rs("cdescription") &

The way I accomplish this atBull City Comics
is I have one table with all the categories. Subcategories are linked to other categories via a ParentID which references the Parent. A category can not be a parent to itself.

I query the database to return the ID, PArentID and name of all the categories and store that to an array. A recursive function writes out the tree structure by iterating through the array. A tree is opened by having the ID present in a cookie otherwise it is closed. The tree also indents itself to offset it for the its parent.

This structure allow for an infinite level of subcategories. I've tested it to over 200 levels without any problems. The only thing I have been able to do with the infinite structure is create a bread crumb trail that works correctly.

I'll just post it here so every one can use it.
It call some other functions that I use on a regular basis.

SetNumericValue checks the value to insure it's numeric. If not then it sets it to the supplied default. In this case 0.

There is a cookie "main" with "strCat" as one of it's elements. strCat is a string of CategoryID surrounded by delineaters ("|"). This cookie value is strValues

strIndent is the string that stores the indenting usually a non breaking space or two. intIndent store the current level of indentation.

arrCat is a two dimensional array. The first array contains the information. The second the position in the record set. The information in the first array are
0 - categoryID
1 - parent category ID
2 - category name

Clicking on the link that closes part of the tree (collapse=1) in the QueryString removes the Category ID from the cookie. Any other click on the category adds the Category ID to the cookie (opening the tree)

The last category clicked is made bold.

<%
' SubRoutine to Display Category
' Requires "|" delineated values for strValues
' Recursive Subroutine
     intCatID = SetNumericValue(Request("CatID"),0)
     Sub DisplayCat (numParentID, strValues, IntIndent)
          For i = 0 to Ubound(arrCat,2)
               if IsNull(arrCat(1,i)) then arrCat(1,i)=0 end if
               if      arrCat(1,i)=numParentID then
               '     response.Write "<nobr>"
                    if not IsNumeric(intIndent)=True then intIndent=0 end if
                    For j=0 to intIndent
                         Response.Write strIndent
                    Next
                    
                    if CLng(intCatID)=Clng(arrCat(0,i)) then Response.Write "<B><i>" end if
                    if inStr(strValues,"|"&arrCat(0,i)&"|")>0 and inStr(Request("url"),strCart)=0 then
                         Response.Write "<a href="""&strCategory&"?CatID="&arrCat(0,i)&"&Collapse=1"">"&arrCat(2,i)&"</a>
"&vbcrlf
                    else
                         Response.Write "<a href="""&strCategory&"?CatID="&arrCat(0,i)&""">"&arrCat(2,i)&"</a>
"&vbcrlf
                    end if
                    if CLng(intCatID)=Clng(arrCat(0,i)) then Response.Write "</i></B>" end if
     
                    if Instr(strValues,"|"&arrCat(0,i)&"|")>0 and arrCat(0,i)>0 then
                         Call DisplayCat(arrCat(0,i), strValues, intIndent+1)
                    end if
               end if
          Next
     End Sub
%>

Edited by ljamal