sort by rank

[Anon]

here's the situation

suppose, A is an Assoc Prof while B is a Professor..
when we search for A and B, i want B to be on top of A, since B is a professor (higher ranking in designation compared to A)

if i did it in descending, of course 'P' would come first before 'A'.. but what if Dean came along? i want the list become

'D'ean,
'P'rofessor, and
'A'ssoc Prof..

when we sort by designation ranking..

how is this possible?

[Anon]

where do you get the search results? from a database, a textfile, an array?

[Anon]

The search result come from a database.

[Anon]

This is what I'd do in this situation.

Create an extra field called 'rank' in this table. Insert values like 1 for the lowest and 5 or whatever for the highest. In your sql statement type 'order by rank asc,name desc limit 0,30'.

You could even get mysql to update rank for you. something like update $table set rank = '1' where name like 'A%';

Hope this helps
Mark Baker

[Anon]

Right now i put all the designation in enumeration. So can i still put a rank in that table?

[Anon]

Yeah, so long as it is 1 for one thing and 2 for another. that should be fine

Mark