PHP: Detect Page Refresh

Question

I have a page action.php on which I run an SQL query through the code, so that whenever the page is viewed the query runs like its like counting page vi

Answer 1

This can work in your scenario:

if(isset($_GET["token"])) {
    $view_token = $_GET["token"];
} else {
    $new_views = $views + 1;
    // UPDATE VIEWS
    $view_token = substr(str_shuffle(str_repeat("0123456789abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz", 5)), 0, 5);
    header("Location: ?token=$view_token");
}

If the user has a token in the URL, the view count will not update. Therefore, if the user tries to refresh, it will not update the view count. When the user does not have a token in the URL, the view count updates and refreshes the page WITH a token. It is thinking outside of the box but it works!