Select Query using mulitple columns

grumpy

Hello-
I have a table with 4 columns called workcat1, workcat2, etc. Whats the best way to write a Select from all the categories against one variable, in this case $ID.?Here's my code. Is there a better way to do this? Thanks

$query = mysql_query("select * from contractors where workcat1 = '$ID' or where workcat2 = '$ID' or where workcat3 = '$ID' or where workcat4 = '$ID' ");

Piranha

The error is in your database design. Read up on database normalization to get to know how you should design databases. There is a good article here on phpbuilder.com about this.

grumpy

Thanks for your reply. I've read that article and still have no idea how to begin. There are 40 categories and each contractor ID needs to able to be associated with 4. Can you give me any tips on where to start?

Piranha

The article tells you exactly how to do it. There it is urls, but otherwise the same problem and the same solution. Give it another try, I'm sure that you will solve it 🙂

grumpy

I've read the article again and still can't figure out how to begin. I must be dense. I understand the article if each category only had one contractor related to it, but in my case, one category could have none or hundreds of contractors related to it. Is there anyone who can help me?

Piranha

Ok, you have tried.

Do a many-to-many relationship between categories and the other table. That table should look something like:

Connection_table
categoryid
other_tableid

grumpy

Thank you. I'll try that.