Programmatically creating UI buttons from a database?

I developed a browser-based resource management game last year and I want to recreate it in 3d. I am new at Unity and have taken some courses through Unity Learn. I have a mysql database up and running and I want to make a list of users with clickable buttons to go to their profile pages. So far I have been able to grab a list of usernames and show them in the game window, but how can I make a clickable button for each user? At the moment all of the users are just mashed together and I can't separate them out into different "items" to put in a button text

Code (CSharp):

1.    
2.     public Text userList;
3.     public GameObject buttonPrefab;
4.     public RectTransform ParentPanel;
5.  
6.     void Start()
7.     {
8.         GenerateButtons();
9.         GetUsers();
10.     }
11.  
12.     void GenerateButtons()
13.     {
14.         for (int i = 0; i < 5; i++) //this isn't helping, this code has no way of knowing how many users there are
15.         {
16.             GameObject goButton = (GameObject)Instantiate(buttonPrefab);
17.             goButton.transform.SetParent(ParentPanel, false);
18.             goButton.transform.localScale = new Vector3(1, 1, 1);
19.  
20.             Button tempButton = goButton.GetComponent<Button>();
21.             int tempInt = i;
22.         }
23.     }
24.     void GetUsers()
25.     {
26.         using (UnityWebRequest www = UnityWebRequest.Get("link to the php code below"))
27.         {
28.             yield return www.Send();
29.             if (www.isNetworkError || www.isHttpError)
30.             {
31.                 Debug.Log(www.error);
32.             }
33.             else
34.             {
35.                 //show results as text
36.                userList.text = www.downloadHandler.text;
37.             }
38.         }
39.     }
40.  

php code:

include("config.php");
$result = mysqli_query($mysqli,"SELECT * FROM users ");
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_array($result)) {
echo $row["username"];
echo "<br>";
}

 

Depending on how the list is separated, which looks like its one per line, you could do.

Code (CSharp):

1. string[] usernames = www.downloadhandler.text.Split('\n');

 

Ok! I was watching a tutorial about this and thought it may be a solution. I will be fetching data from the database pretty often, is it necessary to make a new php document for each thing I want to do or can I make methods within the php that I call from C#?

After finding the usernames and attaching them to the buttons, I want to also attach an ID number to the button that I can use to populate fields in a profile page scene.

 

Try to avoid lots of calls to the server, especially when your creating new objects on the heap that will be discarded to be collected by the garbage collector.

You can actually send more information than just a username each time. Each entry can be separated by line, while each piece of data for the user can be separated by comas. You can make a c# class that holds this information for you

Code (CSharp):

1. public class UserData {
2.     public string username;
3.     public int id;
4. }
5.  
6. string[] users = www.downloadhandler.text.Split('\n');
7. UserData[] usersData = new UserData[users.length];
8. for (int i = 0; i < users.Length; i++)
9. {
10.     string[] data = users.Split(',');
11.     UserData uData = new UserData();
12.     uData.username = data[0];
13.     uData.id = System.Int32.Parse(data[1]);
14.     usersData[i] = uData;
15. }
16.  

Based on your php code, which is probably wrong as I have never done php before.
include("config.php");
$result = mysqli_query($mysqli,"SELECT * FROM users ");
while ($row = mysqli_fetch_array($result)) {
echo $row["username"],$row["id"];
echo "<br>";
}

Once you have the data you want for the users, its just a matter of instantiating your buttons and associating the data with that button. This is quite open ended as it is based on how your buttons are setup and which UI you are using.

 

Thanks for this explanation! Things are starting to make more sense. I'll work on this a bit and let you know how it goes. So grateful that there are helpful people willing to assist!

 

For instantiating dynamic amounts of UI thingies, I always leave "Examples" in the UI hierarchy and duplicate them as many times as necessary, always making sure they are Instantiate<T>ed with a parent argument.

See example attached.

 

You might want to look at these:
https://zetcode.com/csharp/mysql/
https://github.com/Hanslen/Unity-with-MYSQL

 

I get an error at "Split" here:

Code (CSharp):

1. string[] data = users.Split(',');

the previous split worked fine, tried for ages to make it work but it should be able to do the splitting bit... I haven't even gotten to instantiating buttons yet

 

Woah, ok so I can just connect directly to mysql from the C# script? This is blowing my mind, I feel like a complete pleb . Soo I fill in the server name and username and things in the unity editor and then just carry on as if I were working with mysql and PHP!

 

Yes you can! In fact, C# has a language feature that is specifically designed to make this easier to deal with, check out LINQ (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/csharp/programming-guide/concepts/linq/). It's a part of the standard library. You can use LINQ by adding a using statement to your script:

using System.Linq;

I often use LINQ even without a database because the list/collection extensions are so nice.

 

I have never done it, but C# is used a lot for web development.

Also, LINQ uses SQL naming conventions.

 

I have to just sit a while and let this sink in. So many possibilities have opened up! Going to try this and let you know if I am eventually able to create those buttons

 

You just need to try and fetch your data from the DB so that it arrives into a List or Array object. Splitting a string by lines seems a bad way to do it.

 

Yeah, that's how I'm used to doing it from my browser based game

 

I only post again because I have tried for hours now but this is giving me a CS0246 error:

Code (CSharp):

1. using MySql.Data;
2. using MySql.Data.MySqlClient;

I tried installing a nuGet for MySql but still have an error? any ideas?