I need to write a PHP function that will look at the properties of each field in a database table. I was thinking of using mysql_fetch_field() to this end, like, for example,
$property = mysql_fetch_field($result);
echo $property->type;
But then I noticed that when a field has ENUM or SET datatype, this code still says the data type is "string". So is there any way to make the program recognize ENUM or SET fields, and return their correct datatype and the set of allowed values?

Technically both of those datatypes are string types ( http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/enum.html and http://dev.mysql.com/tech-resources/...-datatype.html ).

As far as the enumerations go, PHP does not have native support for this type. The database, however, will enforce the constraint, but once you pull the value from the database it will be a string. Regarding the set type, find out what the default delimiter is (I think it is , but I've never used this type myself) when you pull if from the database and you should be able to use explode to parse it into an array.

On a side note, neither of those datatypes are used very commonly.

Thanks, NullPointer, but how do I find out if the field type is enum?

Try the Describe command: http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/describe.html

Edit: I found a function using SHOW FIELDS that might help:
http://us2.php.net/manual/en/functio...type.php#69718

I use a modification of the script below to index a database for automatic form creation. It should help.

PHP Code:

// $db is an instance of MySQLi
$db_configuration = array();

if ($current_tables = $db->query("SHOW TABLES")) {
  if ($current_tables->num_rows > 0) {
    while ($a_table = $current_tables->fetch_assoc()) {
      $table_name = current($a_table);
      if ($table_columns = $db->query("SHOW COLUMNS FROM ".$table_name)) {
        while ($a_column = $table_columns->fetch_assoc()) {
          $db_configuration[$table_name][$a_column['Field']] = $a_column['Type'];
        }
      }
    }
  }
} 


Thanks for your input. I think I now have the answer to my question. A code like this will return the enum values for a given field either as string or as array:

function getEnumsAsString($table,$field)
{
$query="SHOW COLUMNS FROM " . $table . " LIKE '" . $field . "'";
$result=mysql_query($query);
$enumvals = mysql_result($result, 0, "Type");
//echo "Enum values: $enumvals<br><br>";
return $enumvals;
}
function getEnumsAsArray($table,$field)
{
$str=$this->getEnumsAsString($table,$field);
$str1=preg_replace("/(enum|set)\('(.+?)'\)/","\\2",$str); //echo $str1;
$options=explode("','",$str1); //print_r($options);
return $options;
}