How does one properly update a mysql field with a NULL value when using a variable in the sql query?
I have a variable called $timestamp. When it’s set to date( Y-m-d h:i:s ) I have to wrap it in quotes because I’m passing a string in my mysql query. When $timestamp is set to NULL, the database query contains '' as the value for $timestamp and the field updates to 0000-00-00 00:00:00. It’s important to keep this field as NULL to show that the process has never been run before.
I don’t want to use now() because then my sql statement is not in sync with my class variable $timestamp.
I don’t want to set $timestamp to ‘NULL’ because then that variable is not accurate. It’s no longer NULL, it’s set to a string that contains the word NULL.
What am I missing here?
After a lot of research, I’ve found that this is a well known problem with no good solution if you are writing your sql queries outright.
The correct solution is to use a database abstraction layer like PDO ( for PHP ), or Active Record ( used in frameworks like Codeignitor and Ruby on Rails ).