Hmm for the previous comment, note that SHOW FIELDS is an alias of SHOW COLUMNS. Very useful if you need to search the mysql-documentation. Here is the link anyway...
http://www.mysql.com/doc/en/SHOW_DATABASE_INFO.html
(PHP 4, PHP 5)
mysql_field_type — Get the type of the specified field in a result
This extension was deprecated in PHP 5.5.0, and it was removed in PHP 7.0.0. Instead, the MySQLi or PDO_MySQL extension should be used. See also MySQL: choosing an API guide. Alternatives to this function include:
mysql_field_type() is similar to the mysql_field_name() function. The arguments are identical, but the field type is returned instead.
result
The result resource that is being evaluated. This result comes from a call to mysql_query().
field_offset
The numerical field offset. The
field_offset
starts at 0
. If
field_offset
does not exist, an error of level
E_WARNING
is also issued.
The returned field type
will be one of "int"
, "real"
,
"string"
, "blob"
, and others as
detailed in the » MySQL
documentation.
Example #1 mysql_field_type() example
<?php
mysql_connect("localhost", "mysql_username", "mysql_password");
mysql_select_db("mysql");
$result = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM func");
$fields = mysql_num_fields($result);
$rows = mysql_num_rows($result);
$table = mysql_field_table($result, 0);
echo "Your '" . $table . "' table has " . $fields . " fields and " . $rows . " record(s)\n";
echo "The table has the following fields:\n";
for ($i=0; $i < $fields; $i++) {
$type = mysql_field_type($result, $i);
$name = mysql_field_name($result, $i);
$len = mysql_field_len($result, $i);
$flags = mysql_field_flags($result, $i);
echo $type . " " . $name . " " . $len . " " . $flags . "\n";
}
mysql_free_result($result);
mysql_close();
?>
The above example will output something similar to:
Your 'func' table has 4 fields and 1 record(s) The table has the following fields: string name 64 not_null primary_key binary int ret 1 not_null string dl 128 not_null string type 9 not_null enum
Note:
For backward compatibility, the following deprecated alias may be used: mysql_fieldtype()
Hmm for the previous comment, note that SHOW FIELDS is an alias of SHOW COLUMNS. Very useful if you need to search the mysql-documentation. Here is the link anyway...
http://www.mysql.com/doc/en/SHOW_DATABASE_INFO.html
krang at krang dot org dot uk
Condensed version of what KRANG said.
To get info on the MYSQL field type, use this code
<?
$result = mysql_query("SHOW FIELDS FROM db_name");
$i = 1;
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) { //go through one field at a time
echo "Field $i: ";
print_r($row) //display all information about A field which can be accessed thru the "$row" array.
$i++;
}
?>
Will display something like:
Field 1: Array ( [Field] => SN [Type] => mediumint(8) unsigned [Null] => [Key] => PRI [Default] => [Extra] => auto_increment ) , SN, mediumint(8) unsigned
Field 2: Array ( [Field] => ENTITY_ID [Type] => varchar(20) [Null] => [Key] => [Default] => [Extra] => ) , ENTITY_ID, varchar(20)
Additional to the note below:
If you're using the "SHOW FIELDS" syntax, be sure that you're adding the table name instead of the db name in the "FROM" parameter:
<?php
$result = mysql_query("SHOW FIELDS FROM table");
?>
Also possible:
<?php
$result = mysql_query("SHOW FIELDS FROM table.db");
?>
or this:
<?php
$result = mysql_query("DESCRIBE table");
?>
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/describe.html
In MySQL 4.1.x, the four TEXT types (TINYTEXT, TEXT, MEDIUMTEXT, and LONGTEXT) return 'blob" as field types, not "string".
For version 4.3.4, types returned are:
STRING, VAR_STRING: string
TINY, SHORT, LONG, LONGLONG, INT24: int
FLOAT, DOUBLE, DECIMAL: real
TIMESTAMP: timestamp
YEAR: year
DATE: date
TIME: time
DATETIME: datetime
TINY_BLOB, MEDIUM_BLOB, LONG_BLOB, BLOB: blob
NULL: null
Any other: unknown
The field type returns what PHP classifies the data found in the field, not how it is stored in the database; use the following example to retrieve the MySQL information about the field....
$USERNAME = '';
$PASSWORD = '';
$DATABASE = '';
$TABLE_NAME = '';
mysql_connect('localhost', $USERNAME, $PASSWORD)
or die ("Could not connect");
$result = mysql_query("SHOW FIELDS FROM $DATABASE.$TABLE_NAME");
$i = 0;
while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result)) {
echo $row['Field'] . ' ' . $row['Type'];
}