What common pitfalls do PHP developers face when working with variables in MySQL statements?
One common pitfall PHP developers face when working with variables in MySQL statements is not properly sanitizing user input, which can lead to SQL injection attacks. To solve this issue, developers should use prepared statements with parameterized queries to securely pass variables to the database.
// Example of using prepared statements to safely insert data into a MySQL database
// Establish a connection to the database
$pdo = new PDO('mysql:host=localhost;dbname=database_name', 'username', 'password');
// Prepare a SQL statement with a placeholder for the variable
$stmt = $pdo->prepare("INSERT INTO table_name (column_name) VALUES (:value)");
// Bind the variable to the placeholder
$value = $_POST['input_value']; // Assuming the variable is coming from user input
$stmt->bindParam(':value', $value);
// Execute the statement
$stmt->execute();