Question

I have the following tables

Dishes table:

Category table:

t_time table:

To get connect a dish with the ingredients I have the following code which works:

$sql = "SELECT d.name, i.item\n"
    . "FROM dish d\n"
    . "JOIN dish_ingredients di ON ( d.id = di.dish_id )\n"
    . "JOIN ingredients i ON ( di.ingredient_id = i.id )\n"
    . "WHERE d.id =1\n"
    . "LIMIT 0 , 30";

but now I want to connect the dish with the matching categories/t_time and cuisine . instead of having time= 6 and Category 3 being displayed when I do the query I want it to display 60 and fish instead. What would be the easiest way to do this? a good tutorial might help as well.

Answer 1

just join the tables just like the way you are doing.

SELECT  d.name, i.item,
        c.category,
        e.cuisine,
        f.t_time
FROM    dish d
        INNER JOIN dish_ingredients di ON ( d.id = di.dish_id )
        INNER JOIN ingredients i ON ( di.ingredient_id = i.id )
        INNER JOIN categories c ON (d.category = c.id)
        INNER JOIN cuisine e ON d.cuisine = e.id
        INNER JOIN t_time f ON d.time = f.id
WHERE   d.id =1
-- LIMIT 0 , 30

If it is possible that a dish can have nullable values on category, cuisine, and t_time, use LEFT JOIN instead of INNER JOIN. Basically, INNER JOIN displays row on which it has at least one match on the table on which you have joined while the LEFT JOIN displays even if it has no rows on the other table.