Create collections of objects

Hi people, I want a class that allows create objects that get the information consulting the DB. So, I am thinking to do something like this: class element { public __construct($id,$type = 'id') { switch($type) { case 'id': $where = sprintf(" id = %d ",$id); break; case 'name': $where = sprintf(" name = %s ",escape($id)); break; //... // get the row and call setName($row['name'])... } } } This works fine, but also I want a good way (efficient) of getting a collection of these objects. I can't figure a convenient way. A static function its a good posibility? I have some ideas but they imply public setters of the class `element'. Thanks for any help. -- Emilio Astarita <emilio.astarita@gmail.com> Gnus http://gnus.org/ <http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html>