so been searching around and not sure what to look for regarding my question. Basically, I am wanting to do what I have going on in my code already (I have the ingredient variables hardcoded), but instead create a single loop to iterate through and assign all available ingredients to the corresponding variable and update my SQL record accordingly. What's the best way to go about this?
I want to make it more efficient, so I don't end up with empty columns in my SQL DB, instead leave it as null in the database if the ingredient strings are empty in the URL API, which consists of ingredients.php?ingredient[]=apple&ingredient[]=pepper&ingredient[]=.....
$ingredients = $_GET['ingredient'];
$ingredient1 = $ingredients[0];
$ingredient2 = $ingredients[1];
$ingredient3 = $ingredients[2];
$ingredient4 = $ingredients[3];
$ingredient5 = $ingredients[4];
$ingredient6 = $ingredients[5];
$ingredient7 = $ingredients[6];
$ingredient8 = $ingredients[7];
$ingredient9 = $ingredients[8];
$ingredient10 = $ingredients[9];
$ingredient11 = $ingredients[10];
$ingredient12 = $ingredients[11];
$ingredient13 = $ingredients[12];
$ingredient14 = $ingredients[13];
$ingredient15 = $ingredients[14];
$wait_time = $_GET['wait_time'];
$query = "INSERT INTO menu_items (rest_id,item_name,item_genre,item_price,item_descript,ingredient1,ingredient2,ingredient3,ingredient4,ingredient5,ingredient6,ingredient7,ingredient8,ingredient9,ingredient10,ingredient11,ingredient12,ingredient13,ingredient14,ingredient15,wait_time) VALUES (?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?,?)";
$stmt = $mysqli->prepare($query);
if ($stmt) {
$stmt->bind_param('issdssssssssssssssssi',$rest_id,$item_name,$item_genre,$item_price,$item_descript,$ingredient1,$ingredient2,$ingredient3,$ingredient4,$ingredient5,$ingredient6,$ingredient7,$ingredient8,$ingredient9,$ingredient10,$ingredient11,$ingredient12,$ingredient13,$ingredient14,$ingredient15,$wait_time);
$stmt->execute();
echo json_encode(array('itemID' => $mysqli->insert_id, 'error' => $mysqli->error));
$stmt->close();
} else {
echo json_encode(array('itemID' => null, 'error' => $mysqli->error));
}