It calls for a intermediate table. You need 3 tables: pf_survey, categories and survey_cat
They look like: pf_survey survey_id, Questions, Whatever, but no categories fields categories category_id, category_name survey_cat survey_id and category_id for each record in pf_survey you will have one or more records in survey_cat. Each record in servey_cat will be one of the tick boxes ticked for that survey_id... so 2 tick boxs, 2 records in survery_cat with the same survery_id... When accessing the data you will need to use some different SQL querys like the JOIN, and/or select more than one table at a time... This is the correct database relationship way of doing it, but if this is beyond you a cheap and nasty was would be to either: A)store a comma delimited list of cat_id in your pf_survey record. B)create a boolean field for each catorgy in your pf_survey table.. Hope this helps Andrew ----- Original Message ----- From: "Duffy Betterton" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Wednesday, August 28, 2002 2:48 PM Subject: [PHP] Does this call for an array? > Here is what I would like to do. I have a simple form that asks for > information from a customer. One of the questions is Which categories of > products are you interested in? I want to store all the data in a table > called pf_survey. All the categories(42) are already listed in a > separate table called categories. I don't think I want to repeat a list > of columns in the pf_survey table if they are already in the categories > table. The categories table is simply category_id and category_name. If > my form has a checkbox by each category name with the corresponding > category_id in the value field - how do I concatenate all the boxes > checked in order to put more than one category_id in the pf_survey > category_ids field? > > Does this call for an array? Does it even make sense to do it like this? > Thank you for any help. > > Duffy Betterton > Director of Publications > 615-277-3265 > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > www.mtadistributors.com > > > -- > PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) > To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php > > -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php