Programming the Perl DBI

Name

bind_col

Synopsis

$rc = $sth->bind_col($column_number, \$var_to_bind);

Binds an output column (field) of a SELECT statement to a Perl variable. See bind_columns for an example. Note that column numbers count up from 1.

Whenever a row is fetched from the database, the corresponding Perl variable is automatically updated. There is no need to fetch and assign the values manually. The binding is performed at a very low level using Perl aliasing, so there is no extra copying taking place. This makes using bound variables very efficient.

For maximum portability between drivers, bind_col should be called after execute. This restriction may be removed in a later version of the DBI.

You do not need to bind output columns in order to fetch data, but it can be useful for some applications that need either maximum performance or greater clarity of code. The bind_ param method performs a similar but opposite function for input variables.