Inverted Index

[jonnyuk3]

I am trying to create an inverted index for fast text retrieval using mysql. Does anyone know how to do this? I would much appreciate any help.

Thanks in advance
Jonny

[mcrbids]

What is an "inverted index"?

I've been doing this for years, and I've never heard of it. What is it, or at least, what do YOU think it should be?

-Ben

[Sxooter]

Since most databases support reverse scanning of indexes, it's unlikely you'll see "inverted index" much in the future.

the only real reason for them to still exist is when you're gonna have a query like:

select * from table order by field1 DESC, field2 ASC

Note that the fields are going in opposite directions.

In this case, being able to invert the second field in the index allows the database to use a multicolumn index for this query.

There's work arounds for this in Postgresql (not pretty) but I don't know of any for MySQL.