short hand for sql

[astralaaron]

example table 1 `users` :| user_id | user_name | photo_url |example table 2 `user_mail` :| message_id | user_id | message |example sql: SELECT `user_mail`.`message_id`, `user_mail`.`user_id`, `user_mail`.`message`, `users`.`user_id`, `users`.`user_name` FROM `user_mail` LEFT JOIN `users` ON `users`.`user_id = `user_mail`.`user_id` WHERE `user_mail`.`message_id`=$msg_id --basically I would like to be able to select * from the user_mail table, then specify which fields from the users table I want to join on.my real tables have many more fields than these and I'm joining multiple ones. I've been specifying every field and it seems like there should be an easier way.

[boen_robot]

If the field names in both tables are the same, as is in this case, you can use USING(), like:

LEFT JOIN `users` USING(`user_id`)

[astralaaron]

Nice, if that joins the whole users table then that would work great. thanks.EDIT: tried it, works perfect, thanks!