Related videos sidebar
Posted by jamie on 01 Feb 2011 in Activity log
Finished the first pass of the dynamic 'related videos' sidebar, which displays a random list videos related to the one the user is currently watching. The code is contained within a findRelatedVideos() function to keep the player.php page decently clean. The function is fully documented and fairly simple to use. Though the function is currently displaying videos based on the <nationality> element within the <person> element, it can switch to any other element value within <person> simply by changing the function arguments.
Here's the function doc verbatim:
* Retrieves a list of videos related to $id based on the contents of $field.
* The field - for example, 'nationality' or 'residence' - should be within the
* <person> element in the video XML file. The default number of videos returned
* is 5, but can be configured with the optional $options array. If the number
* of related videos is greater than the number of videos to be returned, then
* they're chosen randomly.
*
* The videos are transformed into <li> elements in includes/xslt/related.xslt.
*
* Due to the structure of the system, the eXist $db object and the results of
* the XML query must also be passed.
*
* The function returns an associative array:
* - videos: the formatted video <li> elements, transformed via XSLT
* - field: the value of $field
*
* @param string $id Video ID
* @param object $db DB object
* @param mixed $xmlResult Result of query from player.php
* @param string $field Name of related field within <person>
* @param array $options Optional settings OPTIONAL
* @return array An array with the videos and the value of $field
* @author Jamie Nay
* @date 2011-01-31
*/
This entry was posted by Jamie and filed under Activity log.