subcategory product display on ViewCat

[Guest spicybrains]

right now, ViewCat shows something like this:

* Subcategory 1 (# products)

* Subcategory 2 (# products)

* Subcategory 3 (# products)

* Product A

* Product B

* Product C

what i want it to do, is show something like this:

* Subcategory 1

-- Subcategory 1 Product A

-- Subcategory 1 Product B

* Subcategory 2

-- Subcategory 2 Product A

-- Subcategory 2 Product B

-- Subcategory 2 Product C

-- Subcategory 2 Product D

* Subcategory 3

-- Subcategory 3 Product A

* Product A

* Product B

* Product C

i tried changing NO_PRODUCTS to being the html to make that, but it failed miserably. i haven't figured out how to access the subcategories' TXT_LINK_CATID in the template to force it there.

any and all help yall can give would be most appreciated!

[convict]

You have to manage viewCat.inc.php doing subcat products loop with appropriate template code. Alternate solution is a expanding category link in side box like this demo.

[Guest spicybrains]

ok, i guess that's the real problem, i really don't know how the templating code loops and where i would put it. like, stuff that doesn't need to loop within the subcategory (like category description and the category-set price/option stuff that i added in) i can access without any problems, but my attempts at looping have been less than sucessful.

i guess this probably should have been in request a mod rather than in skinning, but at least in 2, it was something easily done and so the transition to the 3.0 series has been frustrating...

my most recent unsuccessful attempt went like this:

// section of /includes/content/viewCat.inc.php

//------------------------------------------------------------

// foreign language & image code removed for brevity



// loop results

for ($i=0; $i<count($subCategories); $i++){

		   // make sure there are products for this subcategory

		   if($subCategories[$i]['noProducts']>0){ 								   



		 //get the prices

				$txt[$i] = "";

		if($subCategories[$i]['has_imp']>0) 

					$txt[$i] .= "<br/>$".$subCategories[$i]['has_imp'] ." per sample.";

		if($subCategories[$i]['has_5ml']>0) 

					$txt[$i] .= "<br/>$".$subCategories[$i]['has_5ml'] ." per 5ml bottle.";

		if($subCategories[$i]['has_10ml']>0) 

					$txt[$i] .= "<br/>$".$subCategories[$i]['has_10ml'] ." per 10ml bottle.<br/>";



		//get the subcategory products, yo! -- add rest later

		$sql="select name from CubeCart_inventory where cat_id=".$subCategories[$i]['cat_id'];

		$subCatProducts = "";

		$subCatProducts = $db->select($sql);

		

		$prods[$i]="";

		for($zed=0;$zed<count($subCatProducts);$zed++)

			  $prods[$i].= $subCatProducts[$zed]['name']."<br>";

		



			 //assign variables

				$view_cat->assign("TXT_LINK_CATID", $subCategories[$i]['cat_id']);

			$view_cat->assign("TXT_CATEGORY", validHTML($subCategories[$i]['cat_name']));

		$view_cat->assign("TXT_SCAT_DESC", $subCategories[$i]['cat_desc']);

		$view_cat->assign("NO_PRODUCTS", $subCategories[$i]['noProducts']);

		$view_cat->assign("TXT_SCAT_PRICE", $txt[$i]);

		$view_cat->assign("TXT_SCAT_PRODUCTS", $prods[$i]);

		

		$view_cat->parse("view_cat.sub_cats.sub_cats_loop");

		   }	



	} // end loop results



$view_cat->parse("view_cat.sub_cats");

<!-- section of /skins/skin/content/StyleTemplates/viewCat.tpl -->





	<!-- BEGIN: sub_cats_loop -->

		<a href="index.php?act=viewCat&amp;catId={TXT_LINK_CATID}" class="txtDefault" style="color:#790000;">{TXT_CATEGORY}</a> <br/>

<div class="txtContentDesc" style="text-align:left;">{TXT_SCAT_DESC}

{TXT_SCAT_PRICE}</div>

{TXT_SCAT_PRODUCTS}<br>  ---<br/>

	<!-- END: sub_cats_loop -->

what comes out is just

* Subcat 1

Subcat 1 Description

Subcat 1 Price

---

* Subcat 2

Subcat 2 Description

Subcat 2 Price

---

* Subcat 3

Subcat 3 Description

Subcat 3 Price

---

Product 1

Product 2

and there should be 4, 5, and 2 products listed, respectively, within the subcats.

i honestly don't know what's wrong because the products are there and are coming out correctly when i echo the sql statement & paste it into hte database. maybe i shouldn't be coding at 4am after working on my thesis project all night

thanks for the suggestion about the product menu mod, but that won't really work for what i'm doing layout-wise as i pretty much eliminated most of the boxes, and what boxes are there, aren't exactly they way they look in the default skins.