MySQL and Perl for the Web

Generating Form Elements from Lookup Tables and Query Results

Up to this point in the chapter, we’ve concentrated on ways to automate form processing by consulting the information that MySQL provides in table descriptions. In this section, we’ll discuss how to generate form elements from table contents rather than table structure. This technique is used most commonly to generate list elements corresponding to enumerations and to sets—that is, lists for which you must pick a single value and lists from which you are allowed to pick multiple values.

Using Lookup Tables for Enumerations

Here’s a simple example where you might want to use a lookup table to generate a form element. Suppose you have several applications that each present a form containing ...