Using ASP pages to page through Recordsets

Explanation
Above code creates the navigation links under the records shown to the user letting him move through the records the way he wants.

This part of the code creates a link to the 'First Page' of the recordset. Here we create a link to our paging.asp page itself by using the Request.ServerVariables("SCRIPT_NAME") variable. Then we set the pagenum variable in the querystring to 1 thus setting the AbsolutePage property to 1 and ending up showing the first page of the recordset.

Now we create 'Previous Page' link which will move the user back to the previous page in the recordset.

Here we use a bit of logic to create the 'Next Page' link. We check to see if AbsolutePage is set to less than PageCount then show the link otherwise show the 'Next Page' text but don't provide a link.

In the end we create the 'Last Page' link. We do that by setting the pagenum variable to PageCount property.

Tips
Paging through the recordset is very simple. The only thing different from simply accessing the database and showing it's records to showing the records in a page by page fashion is to set CursorLocation to 'adUseClient' and PageSize to the number of records you want to show per page. After that open the database as you would do normally.

Then set AbsolutePage to the recordset page you want to show to the user. You can set it manually or set it by using a bit of logic as we did in the paging.asp page built in this article.

Now you are all set. Simply use a For...Next loop as discussed in the article and show the records.

Now tell me it was difficult. If you are unsure read it over because this is some thing which you will use repeatedly in your ASP database pages and makes seeing and moving through records more easy and fun.

Summary
We have learned how to show records in a page by page fashion using ASP pages. We saw that it was very easy and all we had to do was to set three Recordset properties and that's it. Enjoy !

' Now showing first, next, back, last buttons.

Response.Write "<div align=""center"">" & vbcrlf
Response.Write "<a href="""
Response.Write Request.ServerVariables("SCRIPT_NAME")
Response.Write "?pagenum=1""><b>First Page</b></a>"
Response.Write "	|	"

If abspage = 1 Then
	Response.Write "<span style=""color:silver;"">Previous Page</span>"
Else
	Response.Write "<a href=""" & Request.ServerVariables("SCRIPT_NAME")
	Response.Write "?pagenum=" & abspage - 1 & """><b>Previous Page</b></a>"
End If

Response.Write "	|	"
	If abspage < pagecnt Then
		Response.Write "<a href=""" & _
			Request.ServerVariables("SCRIPT_NAME")
		Response.Write "?pagenum=" & abspage + 1 & """>Next Page</a>"
	Else
		Response.Write "<span style=""color:silver;""" & _
			"><b>Next Page</b></span>"
End If

Response.Write "	|	"
Response.Write "<a href=""" & Request.ServerVariables("SCRIPT_NAME")
	Response.Write "?pagenum=" & pagecnt & """><b>Last Page</b></a>"
Response.Write "</div>" & vbcrlf

Else
	Response.Write "No records found!"
End If

rs.Close
Set rs = Nothing

%>
</body>
</html>