Question

I want to update the values of one column in a table from ‘0’ to ‘1’, if either of four values in columns in another table are ‘1’. Somehow this doesn’t seem to work and I was just wondering if anyone could help me get the code right or find a different way of doing it if it’s not possible,

mysql_query("UPDATE members 
            INNER JOIN forum_banners ON members.id = forum_banners.userid
            SET members.beta = '1' WHERE forum_banners.bebeta = '1' OR 
            forum_banners.bibeta = '1' OR forum_banners.cbeta = '1' OR 
            forum_banners.wbeta = '1'") or die(mysql_error()); 

That’s what I tried, but it’s not working, I suspect because of the OR. I tried having all updatings in different mysql_query bits, but that didn’t work either.

Answer 1

You should be able to update from multiple table references. This is untested, but gives you an idea:

UPDATE 
    members, forum_banners 
SET 
    members.beta = '1'
WHERE 
    members.id = forum_banners.userid 
    AND forum_banners.bebeta = '1' 
    OR forum_banners.bibeta = '1' 
    OR forum_banners.cbeta = '1' 
    OR forum_banners.wbeta = '1'

http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/update.html

Note “Multi-Table syntax”