Using two mysql tables

[[-razer-]Blade]

Ok I am trying to display my news and who posted it. But when the news is entered into my database, instead of posting the users name in there I put their ID. So what I want to do is match up their id with the one in the news table so it will then display their username instead of their id. The reason I do it this way is in case the member ever changes their name it will automatically be updated in the news table as well. any help is appreciated.

[rajivgonsalves]

you have to use database joins

 

http://dev.mysql.com/tech-resources/articles/intro-to-normalization.html#07

[marcus]

You can create a function I suppose. I do this with my website.

 

function uname($id){
$sql = "SELECT username FROM `users` WHERE `id`='".mysql_real_escape_string($id)."'";
$res = mysql_query($sql) or die(mysql_error());

   if(mysql_num_rows($res) == 0){
      return "Invalid User";
   }else {
      $row = mysql_fetch_assoc($res);
      return $row['username'];
   }
}

echo uname(5);

[[-razer-]Blade]

Yes, I have been reading my my php and mysql for dummies book about the table joins but for some reason they just confuse me  :'(

 

maybe this will help. Here is the code I was using before I made my database like this.

^{$query = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM news ORDER BY news_id DESC LIMIT 0,5");}

 

^{while($row = mysql_fetch_array($query)) {}

^{$news_id = $row['news_id'];}

^{$news_title = $row['news_title'];}

^{$news_text = $row['news_text'];}

^{$news_postedby = $row['news_postedby'];}

^{$news_date = $row['news_date'];}

 

 

^?>

^{<table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">}

  ^<tr>

    ^{<td width="12"><img src="images/content_top_left.png" width="12" height="12" alt="" /></td>}

    ^{<td class="content_top"></td>}

    ^{<td width="12"><img src="images/content_top_right.png" alt="" width="11" height="12" /></td>}

  ^</tr>

  ^<tr>

    ^{<td class="content_left"></td>}

    ^{<td class="content_main"><div id="header" align="center"><?php echo $news_title; ?></div>}

      ^{<?php echo $news_text; ?>}

      ^{<div align="center">Posted by:<?php echo $news_postedby; ?> on <?php echo $news_date; ?></div></td>}

    ^{<td class="content_right"></td>}

  ^</tr>

  ^<tr>

    ^{<td width="12"><img src="images/content_bottom_left.png" alt="" width="12" height="25" /></td>}

    ^{<td class="content_bottom"></td>}

    ^{<td width="12"><img src="images/content_bottom_right.png" alt="" width="11" height="25" /></td>}

  ^</tr>

^</table>

^<?php

^}

^?>