Help starting Pagination

[KathleenODell]

I'm trying to create a "news" page and only want to display a few articles at a time. I've added a pagination navigation at the bottom of the page but I have no idea how to even start getting everything to work. I've done a lot of googling but I can't find an tutorials that can help. Nearly everything I found is on how to just create the nav bar. I've seen suggestions on jQuery plugins and so on, but nothing on how to even get started. Can someone point me in the right direction?

Sample of code (if needed)

    <div class="col-lg-8">

      <article class="row">

        <div class="col-xs-12">

          <h1>News</h1>

          <hr>

          <img src="Images/Originals/header placeholder.jpg" alt="Placeholder image" class="img-responsive center-block" id="header_image">

          <h4>August 30, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Mr. John Klingel joins Quantum Research International, Inc.</a></p>

          <h4>August 16, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Quantum Research International and Adcole Maryland Aerospace Announce Successful Launch of Kestrel Eye Block II Satellite</a></p>

          <h4>July 13, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Quantum Awarded Work for Joint Staff Combined Fire Support Interoperability Division</a></p>

          <h4>July 13, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Quantum Awarded Work for Joint Staff Deployable Analysis Team</a></p>

          <h4>June 23, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Quantum Awarded Work for Operationally Responsive Space Support</a></p>

          <h4>April 5, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">National Security Cyber Assistance Program (NSCAP) Vulnerability Assessment Service Accreditation</a></p>

          <h4>Februrary 10, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Mr. James Lackey Joins Quantum as Senior VP and Defense Systems Group Manager</a></p>

          <h4>Februrary 10, 2017</h4>

          <p><a href="#" target="_parent">Mr. Brad Kettner Promoted to Manager, Space and Warfighter Division and Program Manager, COSMIC</a></p>

            </div>

      </article>

    </div>

  </div>

  <div class="row">

    <div class="col-xs-12">

    <nav class="text-center">

    <!-- Add class .pagination-lg for larger blocks or .pagination-sm for smaller blocks-->

    <ul class="pagination">

      <li> <a href="#" aria-label="Previous"> <span aria-hidden="true">&laquo;</span> </a> </li>

      <li class="active"><a href="#">1</a></li>

      <li><a href="#">2</a></li>

      <li><a href="#">3</a></li>

      <li><a href="#">4</a></li>

      <li class="disabled"><a href="#">5</a></li>

      <li> <a href="#" aria-label="Next"> <span aria-hidden="true">&raquo;</span> </a> </li>

    </ul>

  </nav>

    </div>

  </div>

[Nancy OShea]

I'm not sure what YOU mean by a news page.  It means different things to different people. 

Are asking about RSS feeds?  Or are you pulling content into your pages from a database of news articles?  Or is this just a collection of static HTML pages?

Nancy

[KathleenODell]

A collection of static HTML pages. Basically it will be a central page within the site that will have links to the various news stories that we post about the company. Here's a site example to help demonstrate what I mean.

Media - Lockheed Martin - Releases

As you can see, this page displays a handful of news stories, each linking to their own page. At the bottom is the numbered nav bar so that viewers can see "more" links.

[Nancy OShea]

Your example is not static HTML.  The URLs and advanced search features tells me it's dynamically driven.

How good are you with PHP & MySQL?

[KathleenODell]

Ah, I see. It's my first time trying to create something like this so I just assumed that's what it was. I've never done anything with PHP or MySQL but I'm very good at following directions.

[Nancy OShea]

Maybe a better question is how much time do you have to learn everything required to build this?

[KathleenODell]

Well I've figured out a way to basically create what I want for the mean time, though it will require a lot of moving things around as I need to add items. So, I have as much time as I need to build this version of the page on the side.

[osgood_]

kathleeno43607728  wrote

Well I've figured out a way to basically create what I want for the mean time, though it will require a lot of moving things around as I need to add items. So, I have as much time as I need to build this version of the page on the side.

The problem with the way you are doing it is its NOT automated so as you say you can kind of fake it by just linking to individual pages but that is not elegant and not really easily managable.

If you are serious about wanting a proper pagination solution first you have to find some tutorials on either mysqli or PDO and php which guide you in how to go about retreiving information from a database.

Once you can  do that then you need to find or write a pagination script in the server language you are intending to use. I advice php because its the most popular and there are lots of pagination tutorials which you can search for on YouTube.

Its not something you are going to be able to do in a few hours or a few days. It will take weeks probably unless you go down the route of buying into a product which can do this for you, most likely the developers over at  https://www.dmxzone.com/ have got something which can automate what you are needing to do.

The other alternative is to store all the information in an XML file and retreive the information from that. That doesn't involve a database. Its simpler and maybe within your skillset but not as robust...

[Nancy OShea · Accepted solution]

I haven't tried this but it might do what you need.

https://newsscriptphp.com/

DEMO:

https://newsscriptphp.com/demo-news.php

[KathleenODell]

Thanks Nancy. I'll keep that link on file. Possible we may end up going that route but I'm going to keep trying to learn how to do it myself.

[osgood_]

https://forums.adobe.com/people/Nancy+OShea  wrote

I haven't tried this but it might do what you need.

https://newsscriptphp.com/

DEMO:

https://newsscriptphp.com/demo-news.php

Looks interesting, just make sure it uses mysqli and not mysql..