[SOLVED] Building a Simple Search Feature on a Website

[limitphp]

I am building a music site, and I want to have a search feature that allows people to search for bands or songs or both from the artist on my website.

 

Do I just use simple queries to do this, or is there a standard different way to handle searches?

ex) select * where band = $query

select * where band = $query or song = $query

 

I couldn't find any tutorials on phpfreaks on the subject.

 

Thanks

 

 

 

[premiso]

where band LIKE '%$query%'

 

Use the like operator.

 

You probably want to split the incoming data at the space and then use that as keywords. Just an fyi.

[limitphp]

You probably want to split the incoming data at the space and then use that as keywords. Just an fyi.

 

so, I'll return results with either word or both words?

 

 

[DeanWhitehouse]

Huh?

 

When they search for a word using LIKE %$searchword% will search the selected db rows for any word that is or contains that word.

[limitphp]

Huh?

 

When they search for a word using LIKE %$searchword% will search the selected db rows for any word that is or contains that word.

 

What if they put in two words and they want to search for any (band or song)?

 

would it look like this:

 

Select * from band, songs where band LIKE '%query%' OR song LIKE '%query%'

 

and lets say they typed in [The Strokes] in the search box.

 

Would that return any band that has The Strokes

 

or would it return any band that has 'the' in it as well as any band that has 'strokes' in it?

 

 

 

[DeanWhitehouse]

Would look like

 

SELECT bandname,songname FROM table WHERE bandname LIKE '%".$query."%' OR songname LIKE '%".$query."%'"

 

And i don't think if someone searched the strokes it will look for the on it's own, i think it searches for the whole string.

[limitphp]

Would look like

 

SELECT bandname,songname FROM table WHERE bandname LIKE '%".$query."%' OR songname LIKE '%".$query."%'"

 

And i don't think if someone searched the strokes it will look for the on it's own, i think it searches for the whole string.

 

Why the extra set of quotes and the periods?

[DeanWhitehouse]

SELECT bandname,songname FROM table WHERE bandname LIKE '%".$query."%' OR songname LIKE '%".$query."%'"

 

Periods??

If you mean the column names (bandname, songname) this is just the columns of the table you will search and retrieve although you can use * for all of the columns.

 

The quotes

 

'%".$var."%'

 

Are not needed, i just like doing them as it is easier to read (when variables stand out) in my opinion but you can do

 

'%$var%'

[limitphp]

SELECT bandname,songname FROM table WHERE bandname LIKE '%".$query."%' OR songname LIKE '%".$query."%'"

 

Periods??

If you mean the column names (bandname, songname) this is just the columns of the table you will search and retrieve although you can use * for all of the columns.

 

The quotes

 

'%".$var."%'

 

Are not needed, i just like doing them as it is easier to read (when variables stand out) in my opinion but you can do

 

'%$var%'

 

Oh, ok.  Thanks guys!