I'm a cold fusion refugee and am having incredible problems with something that I think is relatively easy -- so I must be missing something basic. I would like to pull info from a query string and use it inside a database call. I can pull the query string into a general variable: <?php echo $section; ?> now I would like to use it in a SQL statement, or in if/else clauses to modifiy results from queries. examples below: USE query_string in SQL : <?php function whatever(){ $username = ""; ... // setting the default variables if(!isset($category)){$category="Something";} if(!isset($section)){$section="SomethingElse";} $connection=@mysql_connect($hostname,$username,$password); mysql_select_db($database); $selection = mysql_query(" SELECT * FROM classes WHERE classCategory = '$category' ORDER BY $reorder $order ") ... ?> The PHP SQL call below work nicely: while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($selection)){ echo $row["sectionName"]; } now I would like to do an if/else to modifiy it: while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($selection)){ if (section == $sectionName){ echo "<b>" . $row["sectionName"] . "</b>"; }else{ echo $row["sectionName"]; } Nothing is working. I must be missing something basic over here. thx, Gil -- PHP Database Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php