PDO fetch one column from table into 1-dimensional array

Question

I'm fairly new to PDO and getting them to work with MySQL. I seem to be getting on alright with inserting new data and retriving single results however this I am stuck with.

I have a table that is made up of ingredients, I'm trying to make all the ingredients into a single array.

I've run the query directly into SQL and it shows me all the results, yet with PDO I can not get this with the just a fetch. When I use the fetchAll approach as below it gives me all the results but in a multidimensional array rather than just an array.

Is there a seperate fetch method or do I have to create a loop which adds the results into $a[]?

$ingredient_q = "SELECT
        `ingredient_name`
         FROM
            `ingredients`
        ";

$ingredient_stmt = $pdo->query($ingredient_q);

$ingredient_stmt ->setFetchMode(PDO::FETCH_ASSOC);

$a = $ingredient_stmt->fetchAll();

Things I've tried:

$a = $ingredient_stmt->fetchAll(); // Returns a multidimensional array (not what I want)
$a = $ingredient_stmt->fetch(); // Returns one single result (the first entry)
$a[] = $ingredient_stmt->fetch(); // Returns one single result but in a multidimensional array.

Any help will be greatly appreciated.

Solution

<?php
$sql = "SELECT `ingredient_name` FROM `ingredients`";
$ingredients = $pdo->query($sql)->fetchAll(PDO::FETCH_COLUMN);

Comments

[AbraCadaver]

Multidimensional because you have multiple rows or a single dimension because you have a single row.

[Marc B]

var_dump($a) will tell you what you're getting...

[SamesJeabrook]

I don't understand, I'm trying to extract all results from a single row, so I assume with that that it would be a single dimension

[Noah]

Then you, my friend, want SELECT * FROM ingredients WHERE [Please put a condition here]. This is not at all related to PDO, PHP, or arrays, but your understanding of MySQL

[Marcus Adams]

possible duplicate of Loop results PDO PHP

[AbraCadaver]

If you have multiple rows in ingedients then you will get all rows with that query.

[Your Common Sense]

Now read the new title and think how fatally you can spoil your chance for the proper answer.