CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phpmysqlarrays
user3167386
user3167386

Reputation: 43

How to retrieve 1 random row from MySQL

I am making a random post generator and the code looks like this:

<?php

$idea_generator = array();

    $ideas_sql = "SELECT * FROM Ideas";
    $query = mysql_query($ideas_sql);



        while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($query)) {
                $id = $row['id'];
                $name = $row['name'];
                $description = $row['description'];
                $keywords = $row['keywords'];
                //Need to add a link function




            array_push($idea_generator, $name);
                sort($idea_generator);
                $number = count($idea_generator);
                //randomly selects idea
                $winner = $idea_generator[rand(0, $number -1)];
                print strtolower($winner);

                }

?>

My problem is that this code returns 3 items out of the test database in different orders. This project is designed to take out only 1 item from this database. Should I stick with this php array method or is there an easier way to accomplish this goal.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 704

Answers (1)

Jonathan
Jonathan

Reputation: 6732

Change your query to this to retrieve one row at random:

$ideas_sql = "SELECT * FROM Ideas ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 1;";

As this query only returns one row, you no longer need to select one random row in your PHP code. Your final code could be like this:

$ideas_sql = "SELECT * FROM Ideas ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 1;";
$query = mysql_query($ideas_sql);

$row = mysql_fetch_assoc($query);
// This is your 'winning' row

$id = $row['id'];
$name = $row['name'];
$description = $row['description'];
$keywords = $row['keywords'];

Upvotes: 3

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