Question

I am trying to add a row in MYSQL table where I want it to contain letters and numbers with a limit of 4 characters (letters or numbers). In the same time.. if somebody wanted to submit something that have 3 characters or 2. I want the rest of the data to be filled with zeros

for example:

23e becomes 023e
2 become 0002
1234 stays the same
123e stays the same

I am trying to achieve the results in MYSQL database only without using PHP. Is it possible? If it is not possible what is the code to do that in PHP?

Answer 1

Use char rather than varchar (this has a set amount of characters). In mysql:

INSERT INTO t1 (col1)
   VALUES (LPAD(?, 4, '0'))

Also easy to do in PHP:

$value = str_pad($value, 4, '0', STR_PAD_LEFT);