Question

I am trying to remove a specific set of data from a MySQL database field, however I am not sure what the best statement would be for this. For example, if I have a data in a field such as…

The use of a secondary password will allow you to gain access to your account from a non-authenticated computer. A non-authenticated computer is any computer that is not your primary computer, an elected authenticated computer or a computer that automatically deletes cookies.
<p>This is a test</p>

…and I want to remove <p>This is a test</p> from the field, what statement would be best?

Answer 1

I personally would recommend the REPLACE string function:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/string-functions.html#function_replace

UPDATE table SET fieldname = REPLACE(fieldname, '<p>This is a test</p>', '');