Database Search

[Dysan]

Hi,

What would be the PHP code for the following HTML form?

• I want to enable the user to search for a particular artist by selecting the appropriate character from the A-Z links.

• Search the Whole site, Artists only, Song only using the keywords box within a selected year range*.

  *The valid years will be retrieved from the database.

<form id="search" method="post" action="">
  <a href="search.php?char=0..9">0..9</a> <a href="search.php?char=[">[</a> <a href="search.php?char=a">A</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=b">B</a> <a href="search.php?char=c">C</a> <a href="search.php?char=d">D</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=e">E</a> <a href="search.php?char=f">F</a> <a href="search.php?char=g">G</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=h">H</a> <a href="search.php?char=i">I</a> <a href="search.php?char=j">J</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=k">K</a> <a href="search.php?char=l">L</a> <a href="search.php?char=m">M</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=n">N</a> <a href="search.php?char=o">O</a> <a href="search.php?char=p">P</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=q">Q</a> <a href="search.php?char=r">R</a> <a href="search.php?char=s">S</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=t">T</a> <a href="search.php?char=u">U</a> <a href="search.php?char=v">V</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=w">W</a> <a href="search.php?char=x">X</a> <a href="search.php?char=y">Y</a> 
  <a href="search.php?char=z">Z</a><br />
  <input id="searchKeywords" type="text" value="Some search values" />
  <select id="searchWhat">
    <option selected="selected">Entire Site</option>
    <option>Artists Only</option>
    <option>Songs Only</option>
  </select>
  from 
  <select id="fromDate">
    <option selected="selected">All</option>
  </select>
  to 
  <select id="toDate">
    <option selected="selected">All</option>
  </select>
  year 
  <input id="searchButton" type="submit"  value="Submit" />
  </div>

</form>

[awatson]

It's going to depend on your database setup, but likely you'll want to do a "LIKE" query to grab artist's whose name starts with the character indicated, i.e.

select * from artists where last_name like '$char%' order by last_name asc

And the process the results of the query however you want. If there's additional elements to the search you can them via AND in the where clause.

[Dysan]

How do I search different parts of the database, depending on what the user selects in the "searchWhat" drop-down box?

• Entire Site

• Artists Only

• Songs Only