I had a little problem using CodeIgniter’s form_dropdown the other day. Form_dropdown produces an output similar to HTML’s form select option. I was trying to retrieve data queried from a database and display the result in a form. Well, after several test and trials, I finally got the script to work. Here’s how I did it.

Form_Dropdown

The form_dropdown function typically has 3 options. The first option is the fieldname. The second option is the option data usually laid out in an array. The third is the selected data.

form_dropdown(‘name’, array(’1′=>’one’,’2′=>’two’,’3′=>’three’),1);

This produces:

<select name=’name’>
<option value=”1″ selected=”selected”>One</option>
<option value=”2″>Two</option>
<option value=”3″>Three</option>
</select>

CodeIgniter

In CodeIgniter, I have a simple script that stores bookmarks. I categorize my bookmarks using tags. When adding bookmarks, I call on the get_dropdown_tags function in Models to retrieve all the tags and display them in array that I can use with form_dropdown. Here are my CodeIgniter entries.

Controller:

$data['tags'] = $this->links_model->get_dropdown_tags();

Models:

function get_dropdown_tags()
{
$tags = $this->db->query(‘select distinct tag from links’);
$dropdowns = $tags->result();
foreach ($dropdowns as $dropdown)
{
$dropdownlist[$dropdown->tag] = $dropdown->tag;
}
$finaldropdown = $dropdownlist;
return $finaldropdown;
}

Views:

In views, I’m simply calling the form_dropdown function using the $tags array passed on by the controller. It’s a pretty neat way to recall data from a database and outputting them in form_dropdown.

<?=form_dropdown(‘tag’,$tags);?>

Finally, a dropdown list that works.