Sort by order of values in a select statement “in” clause in mysql

Actually, this is better:

SELECT * FROM your_table
WHERE id IN (5,2,6,8,12,1)
ORDER BY FIELD(id,5,2,6,8,12,1);

heres the FIELD documentation:

http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/string-functions.html#function_field