MySQL in a Nutshell

Name

mysql_field_count( )

Synopsis

unsigned int mysql_field_count(MYSQL *mysql)

This returns the number of columns in a results set. You can also use this function to test whether there was an error in a SELECT query. A SELECT query will return at least one blank field when there is an error, resulting in a value of 0 for the function.

...
if(!result)
   {
    if(mysql_field_count(mysql) =  = 0)
       {
        printf("Error \n");
        exit(EXIT FAILURE);
       }
   }
...

See the entry for the mysql_fetch_row( ) function for another example involving this function.