mysqli prepared statement without bind_param - php

Question

I have this code for selecting fname from the latest record on the user table.
$mysqli = new mysqli(HOST, USER, PASSWORD, DATABASE);
$sdt=$mysqli->('SELECT fname FROM user ORDER BY id DESC LIMIT 1');
$sdt->bind_result($code);
$sdt->fetch();
echo $code ;
I used prepared statement with bind_param earlier, but for now in the above code for first time I want to use prepared statement without binding parameters and I do not know how to select from table without using bind_param(). How to do that?

Answer 1

If, like in your case, there is nothing to bind, then just use query()
$res = $mysqli->query('SELECT fname FROM user ORDER BY id DESC LIMIT 1');
$fname = $res->fetch_row()[0] ?? false;
But if even a single variable is going to be used in the query, then you must substitute it with a placeholder and therefore prepare your query.
However, in 2022 and beyond, (starting PHP 8.1) you can indeed skip bind_param even for a prepared query, sending variables directly to execute(), in the form of array:
$query = "SELECT * FROM `customers` WHERE `Customer_ID`=?";
$stmt = $db->prepare($query);
$stmt->execute([$_POST['ID']]);
$result = $stmt->get_result();
$row = $result->fetch_assoc();

Answer 2

The answer ticked is open to SQL injection. What is the point of using a prepared statement and not correctly preparing the data. You should never just put a string in the query line. The point of a prepared statement is that it is prepared. Here is one example
$query = "SELECT `Customer_ID`,`CompanyName` FROM `customers` WHERE `Customer_ID`=?";
$stmt = $db->prepare($query);
$stmt->bind_param('i',$_POST['ID']);
$stmt->execute();
$stmt->bind_result($id,$CompanyName);
In Raffi's code you should do this
$bla = $_POST['something'];
$mysqli = new mysqli(HOST, USER, PASSWORD, DATABASE);
$stmt = $mysqli->prepare("SELECT `fname` FROM `user` WHERE `bla` = ? ORDER BY `id` DESC LIMIT 1");
$stmt->bind_param('s',$_POST['something']);
$stmt->execute();
$stmt->bind_result($code);
$stmt->fetch();
echo $code;
Please be aware I don't know if your post data is a string or an integer. If it was an integer you would put
$stmt->bind_param('i',$_POST['something']);
instead. I know you were saying without bind param, but trust me that is really really bad if you are taking in input from a page, and not preparing it correctly first.