Populate PHP Combo Box using MySQL Database Field Enum Values - php

Question

I would like to create a combo box (eventually operating it using jQuery Ajax), which is populated with the enum values from a database table field.
My goal is to later use these options to filter mysql_query results on a page.
I'm thinking the best way to do this is to echo the entire form and combo box with the enum values as the option tags values. Where I fall short is knowing how to call the enum values in the first place.
If you have a better suggestion on how to do this, please let me know!
Thanks.
I found the following code, which appears to do what I need. However, it seems to grab all the enum arrays from my table, and convert each array into a combo box. This isn't a problem as I was hoping to create combo boxes for each of the separate arrays anyway. However, I wish to change the order of it. Is there any way I can edit this code to control each set? Or even have it specify which field I would like to echo, and then repeat as many times as I need? I know that doing that would mean more code, and would not be as efficient.
The PHP:
$table="images";
$describe=mysql_query("describe $table");
while ($ligne=mysql_fetch_array($describe)){
extract($ligne);
if (substr($Type,0,4)=='enum'){
$liste=substr($Type,5,strlen($Type));
$liste=substr($liste,0,(strlen($liste)-2));
$enums=explode(',',$liste);
if (sizeof($enums)>0){
echo "<select name='enum'>\n";
for ($i=0; $i<sizeof($enums);$i++){
$elem=strtr($enums[$i],"'"," ");
echo "<option value='".$elem."'>".$elem."</option>\n";
}
echo "</select>";
}
}
}
Thought I should mention, the three fields that contain enums are imgFamily, imgClass, and imgGender. I would like the combo boxes in that order preferably.

Answer 1

You can use:
SELECT column_type FROM information_schema.columns WHERE table_name = :myTable AND column_name = :myColumn
This will return something like this:
enum('one','two','three')
Which you could parse in php. However, I think it would perhaps be better to maintain the list in code or another table than as enum values.