Searching a database

[gazmania]

I am hoping to use a PHP form to search a database for user input and I am fairly stuck as to where to start.

I know it's a bit cheeky but has anyone got any sample code or websites that cover it, as all the places I have seen seem to go far too in depth 😕.

Thanks for your help

[sarahk]

So, you know abit about ASP? Do you know anything about databases? The first thing you need to know is SQL. I visited a great site the other day but the url escapes me.

I think you need to view some of the online tutorials covering forms (ie setting up your database query), get yourself a database handling class and maybe post your objectives, data needs here for others to comment on.

I'm afraid your posting was incredibly vague and it's hard to know what help you really need.

[jerdo]

Try http://www.webmonkey.com it's got a pretty good mysql/php tutorial for a beginner

[EqualHate]

here is the code I use. I use this on the front page of my site:
<form action="index.php" method="post">
<input type="hidden" name="content" value="search.php">
<input type="text" name="searchstring" cols="10">
Search the site
</textarea><br />
<input type="submit" value="SEARCH" />
</form>

what this does is reload the page when you submit with as if you had doen the following:
"http://.../index.php?content=search.php&searchstring=your+search"

now the code on reload is here:

connect to your databaseserver
select database

$search_result = @mysql_query("SELECT NewsTitle, NewsDate, NewsBody, NewsAuthor, name, email FROM content, authors WHERE NewsAuthor=authors.ID AND NewsBody LIKE '%$searchstring%' ORDER BY NewsDate DESC");
while ($data = mysql_fetch_array ($search_result)) {
	$newstitle = $data["NewsTitle"];
	$newsbody = $data["NewsBody"];
	$newsdate = $data["NewsDate"];
	$name = $data["name"];
	$email = $data["email"];
	echo"<tr><td class='newstitle'>$newstitle</td></tr>" .
		"<tr><td class='newsdate'>$newsdate</td></tr>" .
		"<tr><td class='newspost'>$newsbody</td></tr>" .
		"<tr><td class='normal'> Posted by:<a href='mailto:$email'>$name </a></td></tr>";
	}

This searches through news on my site and posts results in a table format with css formatting included ("class=").
It took me a while to tweak this and I know it works, so if you have questions, feel free to mail me.