CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phpmysqlsql-like
pg.
pg.

Reputation: 2531

Simple PHP query question: LIKE

When I replace

$ordering = "apples, bananas, cranberries, grapes";

with

$ordering = "apples, bananas, grapes";

I no longer want cranberries to be returned by my query, which I've written out like this:

$query = "SELECT * from dbname where FruitName LIKE '$ordering'";

Of Course this doesn't work, because I used LIKE wrong. I've read through various manuals that describe how to use LIKE and it doesn't quite make sense to me.

If I change the end of the db to "LIKE "apples"" that works for limiting it to just apples. Do I have to explode the ordering on the ", " or is there a way to do this in the query?

Upvotes: 0

Views: 916

Answers (4)

Vidar Vestnes
Vidar Vestnes

Reputation: 42964

try using 

SELECT * from dbname WHERE FruitName IN ('apples','bananas','grapes')

if you need the result to be in the same order as the IN list extend the query with and ORDER BY

SELECT * from dbname WHERE FruitName IN ('apples','bananas','grapes') ORDER BY FruitName

Upvotes: 2

John Kugelman
John Kugelman

Reputation: 361565

You need to explode the string and convert it to the appropriate SQL. This is probably the SQL syntax you want to end up with:

SELECT * FROM dbname WHERE FruitName IN ('apples', 'bananas', 'grapes')

PHP code:

$fruits = array();

foreach (explode(', ', $ordering) as $fruit) {
    $fruits[] = "'" . mysql_real_escape_string($fruit) . "'";
}

$fruits = implode(', ', $fruits);
$sql = "SELECT * FROM dbname WHERE FruitName IN ($fruits)";

Upvotes: 2

Paolo
Paolo

Reputation: 22638

LIKE is normally used for partially matching strings, e.g. you'd use 

WHERE fruitname LIKE 'app%'

to find 'apple' and 'apples'.

What you (probably) want is the IN clause, e.g.

WHERE fruitname IN ('apples', 'bananas', 'grapes')

Upvotes: 8

Mitch Dempsey
Mitch Dempsey

Reputation: 39869

It probably should be:

SELECT * FROM database WHERE FruitName IN ('apples','bananas','grapes')

Upvotes: 2

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