Random record from mysql database with CodeIgniter - php

Question

I researched over the internet, but could not find anything...
I have a mysql db, and records at a table, and I need to get random record from this table at every page load. how can I do that? Is there any func for that?
Appreciate! thanks
SORTED:
link: http://www.derekallard.com/blog/post/ordering-database-results-by-random-in-codeigniter/
$this->db->select('name');
$query = $this->db->get('table');
$shuffled_query = $query->result_array();
shuffle ($shuffled_query);
foreach ($shuffled_query as $row) {
echo $row['name'] . '<br />';
}

Answer 1

Codeigniter provides the ability to order your results by 'RANDOM' when you run a query. For instance
function get_random_page()
{
$this->db->order_by('id', 'RANDOM');
or
$this->db->order_by('rand()');
$this->db->limit(1);
$query = $this->db->get('pages');
return $query->result_array();
}
I've used this before and found it to work fine.

Answer 2

I don't know about codeigniter, but getting a random dataset is
SELECT * FROM table ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 1
The relevant part is "ORDER BY RAND()", obviously.

Answer 3

Do you know how many records there are in the table? You could do something like this:
$count=mysql_exec('select count(*)-1 from some_table');
$count=rand(1,$count);
then:
select * from
some_Table
limit $count,1

Answer 4

This code snippet worked well for me.
$this->db->select('name');
$this->db->order_by('rand()');
$this->db->limit(1);
$query = $this->db->get('<table>'); //<table> is the db table name
return $query->result_array();

Answer 5

Getting random record from large table is very expensive.
Don't use ORDER BY RAND().
This is a bad idea, but if you have a small table no problem.
In a huge databases this type of queries very slow.

Answer 6

I use codeigniter with datamapper. This is the code which I use to get a record randomly from table Advertiser:
$ad = new Advertiser();
$ad->limit(3);
$ad->order_by('id', 'RANDOM');
$ad->get();

Answer 7

SELECT product_id, title, description
FROM products
WHERE active = 1
AND stock > 0
ORDER BY RAND()
LIMIT 4
The ORDER BY RAND() clause returns random records! You can limit records also using LIMIT.

Answer 8

Lets think we have table where we deleted some rows. There is maybe ID not continues correctly. For sample id: 1,5,24,28,29,30,31,32,33 (9 rows)
mysql_num_rows returns 9
Another methods will return not existing rows:
$count=9; //because mysql_num_rows()==9
$count=rand(1,$count); // returns 4 for sample, but we havn't row with id=4
But with my method you always get existing rows. You can separate code and use first 2 code anywhere on site.
// Inside of Controller Class
function _getReal($id,$name_of_table)
{
$Q=$this->db->where('id',$id)->get($name_of_table);
if($Q->num_rows()>0){return $Q;}else{return FALSE;}
}
function _getLastRecord($name_of_table)
{
$Q=$this->db->select("id")->order_by('id DESC')->limit("1")->get($name_of_table)->row_array();
return $Q['id'];
}
function getrandom()
{
$name_of_table="news";
$id=rand(1,$this->_getLastRecord($name_of_table));
if($this->_getReal($id,$name_of_table)!==FALSE)
{
echo $id;
// Here goes your code
}
else
{
$this->getrandom();
}
// END

Answer 9

Getting random record from large table is very expensive. But bellow this code is very effective ..
$count=mysql_num_rows(mysql_query("select * from table_name WHERE SOME_OF_YOUR_CONDITION"));
$nums=rand(1,$count);
mysql_query(" select * from table_name WHERE SOME_OF_YOUR_CONDITION LIMIT $count,1");
This will be helpful ...

Answer 10

I think this is not best way. For sample, you've deleted record which is now==$count. You must iterate this for mysql_num_rows()

Answer 11

This function retrieve all rows in table in random order
public function get_questions(){
$this->db->select('*');
$this->db->order_by('rand()');
$this->db->from('multiple_choices');
$query = $this->db->get();
return $query->result_array();
}

Answer 12

Random row without ORDER BY RAND() query:
$all_rows = $this->db->get('table')->result_array();
$random_row = $all_rows[rand(0,count($all_rows)-1)];