Greg K — Tue, 13 Nov 2007 18:12:51 +0000

Just off of the top of my head this is what I would do:

Add a field to the table called "HoldTo", and make it hold a time stamp value

Now if a client thinks they want those seats, set the current time stamp value in that field

Every time you do a search for available seats, add to the WHERE clause a statement that also only grabs seats whose HoldTo time stamp is at least 30 minutes old.

When they go to place the order (or each page they visit while looking around), look up the time difference and let them know "Seats will be hold for xx more minutes" or something. On each step of the payment of the order, always check to make sure and right before actually processing the payment, extend it for five minutes so in cause they have to reenter card info, etc.

Also allow them to have a link to cancel the hold on the seats. If they don't clear it and don't order, after 30 minutes they will become part of the search results again.

Just make sure at each step you check for availability. I may go to the site, and get told seat 44 is available, but I try to call my wife to make sure she likes that seat. 2 minutes later you log on, and you choose seat 44. Because I'm just looking at a page of what is available when I first loaded it 5 minutes ago, I can still click on a link to choose seat 44. So it needs to recheck when i select it cause you picked it while i was on hold....

-Greg