From the DBI documentation (https://metacpan.org/pod/DBI#Placeholders-and-Bind-Values):
Also, placeholders can only represent single scalar values. For example, the following statement won't work as expected for more than one value: "SELECT name, age FROM people WHERE name IN (?)" # wrong "SELECT name, age FROM people WHERE name IN (?,?)" # two names You may have to prepare the query each time unless you have a fixed number of elements in the IN clause. HTH, Mark Vaughan Neustar, Inc. / Lead Consulting Services Consultant, Professional Services 8532 Concord Center Drive, Englewood, CO 80112, USA Office: +1.303.802.1308 Fax: +1.303.802.1350 / mark.vaug...@neustar.biz -----Original Message----- From: Bruce Ferrell [mailto:bferr...@baywinds.org] Sent: Tuesday, April 05, 2016 10:24 AM To: dbi-users@perl.org Subject: suppress quoting in prepared sql I'm generating a sql statement like this: sth = $mysql_dbh->prepare( "select sum(column) as columnSum from table where value in ( ? ) and row_date between cast( ? as date) and cast( ? as date) "); sth->execute( $ValueIDs ,$week_start_date,$week_end_date); $ValueIDs is a series of unquoted values: 01161,01162,01262,01147,01034,01125,01125,01017,01125,01278,01204,01164 When observed at the mysql server, the sql appears as follows: select sum(column) as columnSum where value in ( '01161,01162,01262,01147,01034,01125,01125,01017,01125,01278,01204,01164' ) and row_date between cast( '2016-03-29' as date) and cast( '2016-04-05' as date) resulting in no data being returned. When the sql is manually entered as follows: select sum(column) as columnSum where value in ( 01161,01162,01262,01147,01034,01125,01125,01017,01125,01278,01204,01164 ) and row_date between cast( '2016-03-29' as date) and cast( '2016-04-05' as date) The correct values are returned. How can I suppress the quoting for the IN clause?