Yeah, that's not good. If tommyw's suggestion doesn't fix the problem (which i think it will), then i recommend logging directly into the mysql database server and issue the following commands:
  1. show databases - this will show you a list of the available databases, make sure 'um' is among, them - if not, then find out which database you need to use
  2. use um - assuming you found it in #1
  3. desc people; - (notice the semi-colon) this will give you a tabular text table containing the field names, their types, and more stuff about the fields.
If you do not see 'firstname' among them - well, that's beyond the scope of this site. But i can point you to the mysql docs, in particular, the alter table syntax.

Pertaining to your 3 errors that you listed (which should have been wrapped in <code> tags i might add), the first and third errors are most likely just side effects from the second error. Fix the second and the other two should go away as well. :)

good luck!
jeffa


In reply to (jeffa) 5Re: dbi insert by jeffa
in thread dbi insert by Anonymous Monk

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