# Create links using erb and mysql

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/create-links-using-erb-and-mysql/180820>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [December 29, 2009, 10:11pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/create-links-using-erb-and-mysql/180820 "2009-12-29T22:11:02Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![adad](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/9e8a1a/32.png) [@adad](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/adad)\
**Post date:** [December 29, 2009, 10:11pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/create-links-using-erb-and-mysql/180820/1 "2009-12-29T22:11:02Z")

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Hi,  
I have a database directory.

On my home page,  
I have these links for (which I handle manually for now):  
A B C D E…(upto ) Z

Each link is hyperlinked only if there is a name starting with that  
letter. If there is no name starting with that letter then that letter  
will be not be hyperlinked.

e.g. C will remain as just text if there is no name starting with C in  
the db.

Further, clicking on A takes me to another page,  
where there are these links:  
AA-AB, AC-AD,…  
as before,any link e.g. AC-AD will be hyperlinked only if there is any  
name in the database which starts with Ac or Ad.

Clicking on any link, eg. AC-AD will be take us to the final page,  
where through a DB query I display all the names starting with AC-AD.

Except for the final page, I am the handling other links (A,B, AA-AB)  
manually so far.

Is there a way to dynamically assign the hyperlinks through a db  
query?

I know how to create the html using erb.

-ad

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![adad](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/a/9e8a1a/32.png) [@adad](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/adad)\
**Post date:** [December 29, 2009, 10:17pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/create-links-using-erb-and-mysql/180820/2 "2009-12-29T22:17:53Z")

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Ad Ad wrote:

> Hi,  
> I have a database directory.
> 
> On my home page,  
> I have these links for (which I handle manually for now):  
> A B C D E…(upto ) Z
> 
> Each link is hyperlinked only if there is a name starting with that  
> letter. If there is no name starting with that letter then that letter  
> will be not be hyperlinked.

[…]

> Is there a way to dynamically assign the hyperlinks through a db  
> query?

The interface you just described seems like a bit of a disaster, and  
there are probably nicer ways to do it. But…

It should be possible to see if you can retrieve one record from the DB  
in the relevant alphabetic range. If so, then make a link. If not,  
don’t. It’s that simple.

> I know how to create the html using erb.

You might want to look at Haml, which gives you prettier syntax and CSS  
abstraction.

> -ad

## Best,

Marnen Laibow-Koser  
[http://www.marnen.org](http://www.marnen.org)  
removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid