Simple list() question!

[msimonds]

I have a question about the list() function that I could not find on php.net;

I am using the following code:

$query = "SELECT blog_id, title, entry, DATE_FORMAT(date_entered, '%M %e, %Y') AS formatted_date
                                  FROM blog_entries ORDER BY blog_id DESC LIMIT 3";
                        if ($r = mysql_query ($query))  // Run the query.
                        {
                        	// Retrieve and print every record.
                        	while ($row = mysql_fetch_array ($r))
                            {
                                list($id, $title, $entry, $date) = $row;
                                //$date = date("F d, Y");
                                $title      = htmlspecialchars($title);
                                $title2     = trim(strtolower(str_replace(' ', '-', $title)));
                                $entry      = nl2br($entry);
                                $cut        = substr($entry, 0, 300);
                                $new_text   = substr($cut, 0, strrpos($cut, ' '));
                                echo "<h2>{$title}</h2>{$date}<br />
                        		<p>{$new_text}<br /><a href=\"$title2.html\">View full story</a></p><br />";
                        	}
                            echo '<a href="archive.php">View all News</a>';
                        }
                        else
                        { // Query didn't run.
                        	die ('<p>Could create the table because: <b>' . mysql_error() . "</b>. The query was $query.</p>");
                        } // End of query IF.
                        ?>

It works perfect but my question is >>> do you have to define a variable for each row in the database? Will the list function not work!

So if i had 5 rows

userid
username
pass
realname
email

and I do this

list($userid, $username, $pass, $realname) = $row;

will that work or since the count is off, will it not work!

I am wondering this to find out if I can use this if we only want to list() certain fields!

Hope this make sense?

Regards,
Mike

[bradgrafelman]

Why not just use a function like [man]mysql_fetch_assoc/man and forget about [man]list/man ? I myself have never seen nor used the list() function when dealing with MySQL result sets...

while($row = mysql_fetch_assoc($exec)) {
    echo 'ID# : ' . $row['id'] . '<br/>Name: ' . $row['name'];
    // etc.
}

NOTE: Since you're using the [man]mysql_fetch_array/man function without a 2nd parameter, the default mode for retrieving columns is "MYSQL_BOTH", meaning that PHP fills the array with keys for both the columns' numeric indeces as well as their names. I still don't use it over [man]mysql_fetch_assoc/man just becase a) I don't ever use the numeric index of a column, and b) since I don't use it, why make PHP do it?

[msimonds]

Thanks for the repsonse 😉

I would use that for Mysql but these scripts that I am writing interact with Oralce!

Maybe I should have placed that in my last post since I used an example out of a mysql call in the example script!

[bradgrafelman]

msimonds wrote:

I am using the following code:

That line of text in your post led me to believe that you were working with MySQL. Obviously, since you are not, the coding snippet isn't what you were using.

What are you using? ODBC connections? The depracted [man]Oracle[/man] functions in PHP? The [man]OCI8[/man] functions? ...?

[msimonds]

Thanks for the reply! My question is more generic than anything:

if you use list($id, $title) = $row and they are the only two entries in the table, it works, but what about if you have more than two rows, say a $row['date'] >> on the list function, do your defined variables have to match the exact row count in a table?

Not just Oracle or Mysql related!

Does that make sense?

Thanks for the help!

Mike

[bradgrafelman]

Instead of using list() you could just use something like [man]extract/man.

[bpat1434]

You can use list, but it would more than likey be used like so:

while(list($id, $title, $entry, $date) = mysql_fetch_array($r))