RAND () not so random

studiobanks

I am tring to select a random record out of my database. Everywhere I have seen online says to write:

$sql_statement = "SELECT * FROM ADS WHERE STATUS = '1' ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 0,1";

But that keeps returning the same record. The last record in the table. Anyone know what the deal is or another way to select a random record.

Banks

kevinsequeira

well i tried this on my system and it worked fine. maybe some other part of your code is affecting the result ??
Have you tired running it directly on your database ?
what does SELECT * FROM ADS WHERE STATUS = '1' throw out ??

reg
kevin

studiobanks

It is so that I can turn on and off the banner ads I wnat to randomly select from. However, I take out "WHERE STATUS = '1'" and it still returns the same result over and over.

Banks

kevinsequeira

how many entries are there in your table which satisy the criteria STATUS = '1'

maybe its giving you the same result over and over again cause there is only 1 row that satisfies the query criteria.

what is the output of SELECT count(*) FROM ADS WHERE STATUS = '1'

reg
kevin

studiobanks

"SELECT * FROM ADS ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 1"

Returns the same record over and over.

Banks

kevinsequeira

😕 😕
what does this do ??

SELECT count(*) FROM ADS WHERE STATUS = '1'

😕 😕
reg
kevin

superwormy

On some platforms with some versions of MySQL RAND() is broken, try running the query twice, sometimes that fixes it.

mysql_query ("SELECT * FROM whatever ORDER BY RAND()");

Then do it again and use the second result:

$result = mysql_query ("SELECT * FROM whatever ORDER BY RAND()");
$array = mysql_fetch_array ($result);

print_r ($array);

mrsocks

thanks for the info Wormy.

is this going to really effect the performance? i only have about 15 rows.

thanks