MySQL "contains" search?

[meman1188]

I'm trying to pull certain phrases out of search queries that users enter. For example, if the search query is "Bill Gates turns 52", I would like to catch "Bill Gates" which is an entry in the MySql table `topics` under the column `topic`. So how do I preform this type of search on the table.. something like "Search Query" CONTAINS (`topic`).

 

It is not a wildcard search (%Search Query%) because the query is bigger than the value in the DB and full text does not work because I want exact matches to the topic name in the database.

 

Thanks for the help

[mbeals]

take a look at full text searching.  it will do what you want

[meman1188]

The problem with full text is it will return partial matches.  For example, "Bill must cross the gates" is not the same as "bill gates", but will be returned in a full text search, not to mention partial results like "bill throws the ball" would cause results also.

 

I can't put the whole search query in quotes, cause i don't want to match the whole thing, just part of it, and I can't think of any way to determine which part should be in quotes, programmatically.  And to solve the partial problem, i could put "+" on the terms, but i don't want all the words to be present, just the one that make up the topic name.

[fenway]

You'd have to break up the user query into part and search for exact matches...