php only returning 1 row from database - php

Question

I have the following php code (in a file returndata.php) to retrieve messages for a user:
$sql = 'SELECT * FROM usertimes WHERE receiver ="'. $messagesforaccount. '"';
$result = $conn->query($sql);
$response = array();
if ($result->num_rows > 0) {
while($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$response['message'] = $row["message"];
$response['date'] = $row["date"];
$response['sender'] = $row["sender"];
$response['receiver'] = $row["receiver"];
}
echo json_encode($response);
} else {
echo " 0 results";
}
Then the javascript is as follows (displays the message and some information on it such as the sender, date etc. on the webpage):
$.post(
"returndata.php",
{ messagesforaccount: userAccount },
function(response) {
var sender = response.sender;
var receiver = response.receiver;
var message = response.message;
var date = response.date;
console.log('Retreived data: ', sender, receiver, message, date);
p = document.createElement('p')
p.innerHTML = message + '<br>' + 'sent by ' + sender + ' at ' + date
listmessages.appendChild(p)
}, 'json'
);
This only adds one message to the page (the last one in the database). What should the php be so it loops through all results, and for each result it adds the message to the webpage?

Answer 1

You did a little bit mistake there. If you want associative array for multiple data then you should have a two dimensional array and you must have an index for second dimensional array as well
<?php
$sql = 'SELECT * FROM usertimes WHERE receiver ="'. $messagesforaccount. '"';
$result = $conn->query($sql);
$response = array();
$index = 0;
if ($result->num_rows > 0) {
while($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$response[$index]['message'] = $row["message"];
$response[$index]['date'] = $row["date"];
$response[$index]['sender'] = $row["sender"];
$response[$index]['receiver'] = $row["receiver"];
$index++;//incrementing index variable
}
echo json_encode($response);
} else {
echo " 0 results";
}
?>
In return you can iterate that array in this way
for ($i=0;$i<count($response);$i++)
{
echo $response[$i]['message'] . "<br>" ;
echo $response[$i]['date'] . "<br>" ;
echo $response[$i]['sender'] . "<br>" ;
echo $response[$i]['receiver'] . "<br>" ;
}

Answer 2

You need to respond with all of them in an array like this:
$sql = 'SELECT `message`, `date`, `sender`, `receiver` FROM `usertimes` WHERE `receiver` ="'. $messagesforaccount. '"';
You should only request the fields you need. This improves performances and reduces overhead. Later, you can just push the whole row to the response.
$result = $conn->query($sql);
$response = array();
if ($result->num_rows > 0) {
while($row = $result->fetch_assoc()) {
$response[] = $row;
}
echo json_encode($response);
} else {
echo " 0 results";
}