displaying categories in the left column in magento - magento

Question

I have recently started working in magento, and my boss has given me the task of displaying categories in the left column. I have the static html file which I pasted inside the .phtml file and called it from the xml block and it displays just the static stuff in the left column.
I want them to be dynamic so that the categories can be added or removed from the backend.
The html that I have is in table format and I want to insert the php code into that same html so that the design is not disturbed and it becomes dynamic.

Answer 1

This might be what you're looking for:
<?php if (!Mage::registry('current_category')) return ?>
<?php $_categories = $this->getCurrentChildCategories() ?>
<?php $_count = is_array($_categories)?count($_categories):$_categories->count(); ?>
<?php if($_count): ?>
<div class="block block-layered-nav">
<div class="block-title">
<strong><span><?php echo $this->__('Browse By') ?></span></strong>
</div>
<div class="block-content">
<dl id="narrow-by-list2">
<dt><?php echo $this->__('Category') ?></dt>
<dd>
<ol>
<?php foreach ($_categories as $_category): ?>
<?php if($_category->getIsActive()): ?>
<li>
<a href="<?php echo $this->getCategoryUrl($_category) ?>"<?php if ($this->isCategoryActive($_category)): ?> class="current"<?php endif; ?>><?php echo $this->htmlEscape($_category->getName()) ?></a> (<?php echo $_category->getProductCount() ?>)
</li>
<?php endif; ?>
<?php endforeach ?>
</ol>
</dd>
</dl>
<script type="text/javascript">decorateDataList('narrow-by-list2')</script>
</div>
</div>
<?php endif; ?>
I used it here: http://marblesthebrainstore.com