Any one can tell me the major benefits of using server side includes on my site.

I've never done server side includes before. however the concept of file inclusion remains the same if you do it via php _script_ or as an apache server include..

now.. you include the file because you wish to have its contents displayed in the page it is included into or have access to the contents of the included file to manipulate at will.

It is easier to maintain one file and include it to may instead of having the contents of the one file in multiple pages and then having to maintain multiple pages to update 1 data set.

example

file a
file b
file c
file d

file z is the file you will include into files a - d.

if you needed ot make a change to the data that is sotred in file z then all the files which includes file z is automatically updated. as comapred to if file the content was in file a - d. You would then have to edit 4 different files to get the same result.

hope i didn't lose you.. ask for further assistance if you dont understand

Thanks very much for your answer. I just found out that ssi has a requirement. If you are running a server that runs php from a cgi framwork then it will not work. That means i cant use ssi on my server. You spoke of another way to include file using php. Hw is this done. Could i like flash, load and unload a file as needed to and from a container file using this php method instead of ssi?

with the include function on php you can include any file type into anypage. This is where the basis of php templating starts.

anyway.. you should be able to include a file. the unloading i'm not so sure about.. you might have to unset the variables after your finished with them.. if your completely anal about having them killed. but you could leave em.. i'm sure it wouldn't really take up that much memory and they would be killed eventually after not being used.

the concept works exactly like i stated above

Code: :

<?php inclulde('file.extension') // can be anything technically blah blah blah more php script which may manipulate the contents of included file ?>

manipulate contents of file.. I've really only included files which store variables I use and re-use all through out my web allications. If this doesn't suit what you want. you may need to expand on what exactly your trying to load / unload from another file via inclusion.

Post edited by: cyberpunk, at: 09/06/2007 10:04pm

Thanks very much. your answer helped me a whole lot. Respect.

NO problem. Glad i could help