Search dir using wildcard string, return filename, and loop

I'm having some problem开发者_C百科s, and looking for some help. I'm trying to create a photo gallery in javascript, that will be able to 'update' it's self automatically. I need to be able to search a directory, and grab a file with a specific prefix.

I need to output the followng HTML code:

<li><a href="images/resize_FILENAME.ext"><img src="images/thumb_FILENAME.ext"></a></li>

The 'resize_' and 'thumb_' use a timestamp to identify, so they have the same ending, just a different prefix.

So, for example, if I search the directory for an image with a prefix of 'resize_', I need to insert that into the a tag, and then remove the '_resize' prefix, and add the '_thumb' prefix for the img tag. I then need to be able to do that for each image in the directory.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Oh, I should add:

I'm assuming php would be easiest for this, but if an alternative exists that would work too. I'm also using jQuery if javascript would be better.

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After some reading about the glob() function, I was able to figure it out pretty easily.

Here's my code:

<?php 
foreach (glob("upload_pic/thumbnail_*.*") as $thumb) {
    $resize = preg_replace("/thumbnail_/", "resize_", $thumb);
    echo "<li><a href='$resize'><img src='$thumb'></a></li>";
}
?>

So, basically, the glob() function searches my upload_pic directory for any file with the thumbnail_ prefix. I then create run the preg_replace() function to replace the $thumb variable's thumbnail_ with resize_, and make that the $resize variable. Then just echo the proper HTML code.

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To search a directory using wildcard string, glob() function can be used.

But how to learn AJAX and use glob() results from the PHP script on the client side, is probably another question.