NAME

    DBIx::XHTML_Table - Create XHTML tables from SQL queries

SYNOPSIS

      use DBIx::XHTML_Table;

      my $table = XHTML_Table->new(
        $datasource, $username, $password
      ) || die "could not connect to database\n";

      $table->exec_query("
            SELECT TITLE,ALBUM,YEAR,GENRE
            FROM MP3.SONGS
            WHERE YEAR=? AND GENRE=?
            ORDER BY ARTIST
      ",[$year,$genre]);

      # save a raw copy for later
      my $raw = $table->get_table;

      # start tweaking the table
      $table->modify_tag('TABLE',{
              border      => 1,
              cellspacing => 0,
      });

      # modify all <THEAD> <TH> tags
      $table->modify_tag('TH',{
              bgcolor => 'black',
              style   => 'Color: white;',
      }, 'header');

      # modify only <TD> tags for TITLE column
      $table->modify_tag('TD',{
              align   => 'right',   # although align is deprecated
              bgcolor => '#ABACAB',
      },'title');

      # modify only <TD> tags for ALBUM and YEAR columns
      # columns -  in this case, each column will permuate
      # the colors and the alignment value
      $table->modify_tag('TD',{
              width   => 200,
              align   => [qw(left center right)],
              bgcolor => [qw(green blue red)],
      },[qw(album year)]);

      # impress the boss with rotating row colors
      # (this would override the above method)
      $table->set_row_colors(
            ["#D0D0D0", "#B0B0B0")],
            [qw(album year)],
      );

      # suppress duplicates on a group
      $table->set_group('album',1);

      # since we can, sum up the years column
      # totals will be wrapped in <TH>'s belonging to <TFOOT/>
      # optional sprintf mask can be used for formatting
      $table->calc_totals('year','%.02f');

      # and if you have a well behaved group set . . .
      $table->calc_subtotals('year','%.02f');

      # print out the complete table
      print $table->get_table;

      # compare it with the raw version
      print $raw;

DESCRIPTION

    XHTML_Table will execute SQL queries and return the results
    wrapped in XHTML tags. Methods are provided for determining
    which tags to use and what their attributes will be. Tags such
    as <TABLE>, <TR>, <TH>, and <TD> will be automatically
    generated, you just have to specify what attributes they will
    use.

    This module was created to fill a need for a quick and easy way
    to create on the fly XHTML tables from SQL queries, for the
    purpose of 'quick and dirty' reporting. If you find yourself
    needing more power over the display of your report, you should
    look into templating methods such as HTML::Template or Template-
    Toolkit. Another viable substitution for this module is to use
    DBIx::XML_RDB and XSL stylesheets, but some browsers are still
    not XML compliant, and XHTML_Table has the advantage of
    displaying at least something on browsers that are not XML or
    XHTML compliant. At the worst, only the XHTML tags will be
    ignored, and not the content of the report.

AUTHOR

    Jeffrey Hayes Anderson <captvanhalen@yahoo.com>

COPYRIGHT

    Copyright (c) 2001 Jeffrey Hayes Anderson. All rights reserved.
    DBIx::XHTML_Table is free software; it may be copied, modified,
    and/or redistributed under the same terms as Perl itself.