{"id":340,"date":"2011-12-13T20:28:04","date_gmt":"2011-12-13T20:28:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.inmotionhosting.com\/support\/2011\/12\/13\/connecting-to-a-database-using-php\/"},"modified":"2023-08-15T16:48:49","modified_gmt":"2023-08-15T20:48:49","slug":"connecting-to-a-database-using-php","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.inmotionhosting.com\/support\/website\/connecting-to-a-database-using-php\/","title":{"rendered":"Connecting to a Database using PHP"},"content":{"rendered":"

Selecting a reputable web hosting company<\/a> is only the first step towards building and maintaining a successful website. Sometimes you may need to connect your PHP driven website to a database<\/strong>. For most content management systems, this is done through the config.php file. Below is a sample PHP script that connects to a database and shows all the fields for a specific table you specify in the code.<\/p>\n

IMPORTANT:<\/b> In order for the database connection to work, you will need to create the database<\/a>, add the database user<\/a>, and be sure that you attach a MySQL user to the database<\/a> before attempting to run the script on the server.If you need to run a database script on your local computer, you will need to set up your computer to run Apache<\/strong>, MySQL<\/strong>, and PHP<\/strong>. You can do this by installing WAMP<\/a> (Windows), MAMP<\/a> (Mac), or XAMPP<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

How to Connect to a Database Using PHP<\/h2>\n
<?php   \n\n\/\/Sample Database Connection Script    \n\/\/Setup connection variables, such as database username \n\/\/and password \n\n$hostname=\"localhost\"; \n$username=\"your_dbusername\"; \n$password=\"your_dbpassword\"; \n$dbname=\"your_dbusername\"; \n$usertable=\"your_tablename\"; \n$yourfield = \"your_field\";   \n\n\/\/Connect to the database \n$connection = mysql_connect($hostname, $username, $password); mysql_select_db($dbname, $connection);   \n\n\/\/Setup our query \n$query = \"SELECT * FROM $usertable\";   \n\n\/\/Run the Query \n$result = mysql_query($query);   \n\n\/\/If the query returned results, loop through \n\/\/ each result \n\nif($result) \n    {   while($row = mysql_fetch_array($result))   \n        {     $name = $row[\"$yourfield\"];     \n              echo \"Name: \" . $name; \n   } }   \n\n?>\n\n<\/pre>\n
\n
NOTE:<\/b> cPanel accounts using PHP 7 or higher would need to use mysqli<\/em> instead of mysql<\/em> –
\ne.g. $connection = mysqli_connect($hostname, $username, $password);<\/em><\/p>\n
You can find your PHP version in cPanel<\/a> or a phpinfo page<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
So let’s take a look at the actual code and what you need to replace:<\/p>\n
$hostname<\/strong>: This almost always refers to ‘localhost’ unless you are connecting to an external database.<\/p>\n
$username<\/strong>: This is the MySQL user you want to connect with. Keep in mind the user must be assigned to the database.<\/p>\n
$password<\/strong>: This is the password for the username you just entered.<\/p>\n
$dbname<\/strong>: This refers to the database name you wish to connect to.<\/p>\n
$usertable<\/strong>: This is not needed to connect but in this script, it refers to a specific table within the database.<\/p>\n
$yourfield<\/strong>: This is not needed to connect to the database but tells the script which field to echo to the screen.<\/p>\n
With reliable PHP web hosting<\/a>, you can effortlessly create and maintain dynamic websites and applications that interact with databases efficiently.<\/p>\n
 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Selecting a reputable web hosting company is only the first step towards building and maintaining a successful website. Sometimes you may need to connect your PHP driven website to a database. For most content management systems, this is done through the config.php file. Below is a sample PHP script that connects to a database and Read More ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":56983,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4288,4305],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-340","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-website","category-databases"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nConnecting to a Database using PHP | InMotion Hosting<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Learn how to connect to a MySQL database using PHP.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.inmotionhosting.com\/support\/website\/connecting-to-a-database-using-php\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" 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