Storing two variables to one field

LordRogaine

using php and mysql, is it possible to download more than one variable into a field?

Example: Field is FRUIT. The variables would be $apples and $oranges.

How would I store both these variable into one field? Is this possible?

su1d

use implode() / explode() or serialize() / unserialize()

Although when you have to store two values in a field, means that you've got a bad DB design. Think about implementing one-to-many or many-to-many relations depending on what you are going to do.

LordRogaine

Hmmmm, perhaps I'm going about this wrong. This is what I would like to do. I have a search form that a user would fill out and then do a search with. This works fine. At the same time, I want to store all the info in my database that the user is looking for. This is a sample of the form I am using. How would I go about this? Use many table for every catagory?

<form method="POST" action="http://mysite.com/page.php">
<p><input type="checkbox" name="fruit[]" value="apples">APPLES

<input type="checkbox" name="fruit[]" value="oranges">ORANGES</p>
<p><input type="checkbox" name="fruit[]" value="pears">PEARS

<input type="checkbox" name="fruit[]" value="peaches">PEACHES</p>
<p><input type="submit" value="Submit" name="submit"><input type="reset" value="Reset" name="reset"></p>
</form>

su1d

I suppose that implode() / explode() functions are OK in this case and you may use something like this:

"UPDATE table_name SET search_fruit = '".implode('|', $fruit)."' WHERE user_id = ".$user_id;

When the data retrieved you will just need to do

$fruit = explode('|', $mysql_data['search_fruit'];

LordRogaine

thanks, Implode works perfectly. I'm going to try explode now. Thanks again

LordRogaine

I had a problem using explode. I se up a very basic page to print my results to just see if it would work. I kept getting different errors with it. So then I tried a very basic select statement and it worked.

$sql = "SELECT *from table where fruit='$fruit'";

Do you see a problem down the line when I apply this to other applications instead of using "explode"?

Thanks for the help!

tomhath

Storing multiple values in one field is asking for problems. That's why a Relational Database allows "relations", so you can associate (or relate) different data items in different tables.