What are the best practices for handling m:n relationships in PHP when dealing with user choices?

When dealing with m:n relationships in PHP, especially when handling user choices, it's best to use a junction table to connect the two entities. This table will store the relationships between users and their choices, allowing for efficient querying and management of the data. 

// Example of handling m:n relationships in PHP using a junction table

// Create a junction table to store user choices
CREATE TABLE user_choices (
    user_id INT,
    choice_id INT,
    PRIMARY KEY (user_id, choice_id)
);

// Insert data into the junction table
$user_id = 1;
$choice_id = 2;

$query = "INSERT INTO user_choices (user_id, choice_id) VALUES ($user_id, $choice_id)";
// Execute the query to insert the user's choice into the junction table

// Retrieve user choices from the junction table
$user_id = 1;

$query = "SELECT * FROM user_choices WHERE user_id = $user_id";
// Execute the query to retrieve all choices for a specific user

Keywords

m:n relationships PHP user choices database normalization join tables

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