Retrieving a Single Cell Value with PDO

In PHP, the PDO library provides efficient database connectivity. When dealing with queries that target a single column in a single row, it's useful to retrieve the value directly into a variable for further processing.

Consider the query:

"SELECT some_col_name FROM table_name WHERE user=:user"

after executing the statement $stmt->execute(), you can obtain the desired cell value using the fetchColumn() method:

$col_value = $stmt->fetchColumn();

This method retrieves the value of the first column in the result set and places it into the $col_value variable.

For example, if the query returns the value 100, the following code will place it in $col_value:

$stmt = $dbh->prepare("SELECT some_col_name FROM table_name WHERE user=:user");
$stmt->bindParam(':user', $user);
$stmt->execute();
$col_value = $stmt->fetchColumn();

Ensure that the query returns a single row and a single column. If no rows are returned, fetchColumn() will return false. Additionally, if the query returns multiple columns, it's recommended to use the fetch() method instead.