How do I make a hyperlink with dynamic data from a php data base table?

Question

Level - Dreamweaver infrequent user
I have a standard master-detail couple of pages using MySQL and PHP. This function is working correctly. One of the data items on the Details page contains the name of a PDF document (including the .pdf suffix). The PDFs are stored in the PDFs library under the Site Root. I am wanting the ability of the page user to look at the associated PDF. Keeping it as simple as possible I just set up a text field 'View Report' followed by the Dynamic Text for the document name. I tried defining the Link Properties with the PDFs library name (plus the root level) followed by the code I thought it needed to identify the selected PDF document ( <? php echo $row_rslivesDetail['ReportLink']; ?> ). The first part is correct because when the code failed I changed it to a fixed PDF document and that worked. I've tried various combinations but not been successful. Can someone please suggest what I'm doing wrong with the code.
Regards
Cliff

Answer 1

Do the PDFs actually reside in your MySql database or are they just in a folder on your server?
To parse files from a folder, you could use something like this:
<h2>PDF Files</h2>
<?php
class SortingIterator implements IteratorAggregate
private $iterator = null;
public function __construct(Traversable $iterator, $callback)
if (!is_callable($callback)) {
throw new InvalidArgumentException('Given callback is not callable!');
$array = iterator_to_array($iterator);
usort($array, $callback);
$this->iterator = new ArrayIterator($array);
public function getIterator()
return $this->iterator;
?>
<!--results-->
<h3>2014</h3>
<?php
function mysort($a, $b)
return $a->getPathname() > $b->getPathname();
$item = new SortingIterator(new RecursiveIteratorIterator(new RecursiveDirectoryIterator('pdfs/2014/')), 'mysort');
foreach ($item as $file) {
echo '<li><a href="' . $file . '">' . $file->getFilename() . '</a> - '. round( $file->getSize() / 1052) . '  KB </li>';
?>
</ul>
In my example above, pdfs is my main folder and 2014 is my sub-folder. 
Results echo inside a list with each file name hyperlinked.  See screenshot.
Nancy O.