For starters, I have only been using PHP for about 2 months now. So, if you feel that there is something I should know, please feel free. I'm all ears.
Secondarily, I have been working on this for a couple weeks now and have tried several different angles. I've been to the manual a thousand times, gotten a few bits of advice from Stack Overflow, and looked through YouTube, which is where I found this tutorial: This one. So, I've been through this tutorial a few times. I recreated the search in the video, and now I'm attempting to convert elements of it to my own project. Problem is, it doesn't seem to be parsing things correctly. I will try to explain below.
Here is a hastebin with the original code from the video: index page and functions page.
And here is my code: search page and functions page.
Basically, this code accepts a bunch of values from possible inputs, parses them, and then creates a custom SQL statement. In the original code, the 'locations' are a bunch of checkboxes and one or more can be selected, and the SQL statement is verbose and complex. In my code, the 'categories' are a bunch of checkboxes where one or more can be selected, and the SQL statement is much simpler. That's really why I can't figure out what is going wrong.
Here are a few things I have tried so far:
1) I commented out the code and used a generic SQL statement, to make sure the values were being queried and displayed correctly. They were.
2) I've watched the tutorial several times to make sure I have the code correct, and as far as I can tell, I do.
3) I've checked the content of variables, etc., to make sure they are getting sent properly, which they appear to be.
4) Since nothing is coming up as a result of this search currently, I removed some of the NOT symbols (!) from the code, and, lo and behold, everything is now a search result. (In other words, it is either ALL or NOTHING. Not very helpful for a search function.) This is what makes me think things are not getting parsed correctly.
I hope this is enough information to get you started. If not, let me now what else I can offer. Thanks for any assistance you can offer!