As these functions return the contents of multiple cells in one function call, they' re MUCH quicker than fbsql_result().
When working on large result sets, you should consider using one of the functions that fetch an entire row (specified below). As these functions return the contents of multiple cells in one function call, they're MUCH quicker than fbsql_result(). Also, note that specifying a numeric offset for the field argument is much quicker than specifying a fieldname or tablename.fieldname argument.