Help with Search Function

[fairous]

Hi,

I want to search a field, and I don't want the same result list twice. Can this be done?

I mean, if I search for like the name "John", I dont' want it to list like 50 Johns lists, I just need John and maybe the counts next to it like John (50 Results). How would I do this?

Another question.. Sorry, call me greedy, but :-)...
In the Same field Author, I have so many different authors,
Is it possible to have a search function where I can search for the 1st letter of the author, example, I want to search and lists all the author starts with A, and Starts with A only.

Sorry.. I am so greedy :-)

Thanks

[sarahk]

some ideas, play with these (to debug) and get a feel for the possibilities

select distinct name from tbl_names order by name

select name, count(*) from tbl_names order by name, group by name

select left(name,1) from tbl_names order by 1, group by 1