More MySQL Functions in PHP
Web database applications can be developed that use only the six functions we have described. However, in many cases, additional functionality is required. For example, database tables sometimes need to be created, information about database table structure needs to be used in reporting or querying, and it is desirable to retrieve specific rows in a result set without processing the complete dataset.
Additional functions for interacting with a MySQL DBMS using PHP are the subject of this section. We have omitted functions that are used to report on insertions, deletions, and updates. These are discussed in Chapter 6.