Search entire table? PHP MySQL - php

Question

I have made the following search script but can only search one table column when querying the database:
$query = "select * from explore where site_name like '%".$searchterm."%'";
I would like to know how I can search the entire table(explore). Also, I would need to fix this line of code:
echo "$num_found. ".($row['site_name'])." <br />";
One last thing that is bugging me is when I push the submit button on a different page I always displays the message "Please enter a search term." even when I enter in something?
Thanks for any help, here is the entire script if needed:
<?php
// Set variables from form.
$searchterm = $_POST['searchterm'];
trim ($searchterm);
// Check if search term was entered.
if (!$serachterm)
{
echo "Please enter a search term.";
}
// Add slashes to search term.
if (!get_magic_quotes_gpc())
{
$searchterm = addcslashes($searchterm);
}
// Connects to database.
# $dbconn = new mysqli('localhost', 'root', 'root', 'ajax_demo');
if (mysqli_connect_errno())
{
echo "Could not connect to database. Please try again later.";
exit;
}
// Query the database.
$query = "select * from explore where site_name like '%".$searchterm."%'";
$result = $dbconn->query($query);
// Number of rows found.
$num_results = $result->num_rows;
echo "Found: ".$num_results."</p>";
// Loops through results.
for ($i=0; $i <$num_results; $i++)
{
$num_found = $i + 1;
$row = $result->fetch_assoc();
echo "$num_found. ".($row['site_name'])." <br />";
}
// Escape database.
$result->free();
$dbconn->close();
?>

Answer 1

Contrary to other answers, I think you want to use "OR" in your query, not "AND":
$query = "select * from explore where site_name like '%".$searchterm."%' or other_column like '%".$searchterm."%'";
Replace other_column with the name of a second column. You can keep repeating the part I added for each of your columns.
Note: this is assuming that your variable $searchterm has already been escaped for the database, for example with $mysqli->real_escape_string($searchterm);. Always ensure that is the case, or better yet use parameterised queries.
Similarly when outputting your variables like $row['site_name'] always make sure you escape them for HTML, for example using htmlspecialchars($row['site_name']).
One last thing that is bugging me is when I push the submit button on a different page I always displays the message "Please enter a search term." even when I enter in something?
Make sure that both forms use the same method (post in your example). The <form> tag should have the attribute method="post".
Also, what is wrong with the line of code you mentioned? Is there an error? It should work as far as I can tell.

Answer 2

A UNION query will provide results in a more optimized fashion than simply using OR. Please note that utilizing LIKE in such a manner will not allow you to utilize any indexes you may have on your table. You can use the following to provide a more optimized query at the expense of losing a few possible results:
$query = "SELECT * FROM explore WHERE site_name LIKE '".$searchterm."%'
UNION
SELECT * FROM explore WHERE other_field LIKE '".$searchterm."%'
UNION
SELECT * FROM explore WHERE third_field LIKE '".$searchterm."%'";
This query is probably as fast as you're going to get without using FULLTEXT searching. The downside, however, is that you can only match strings beginning with the searchterm.

Answer 3

To search other columns of table you need to add conditions to your sql
$query = "select * from explore where site_name like '%".$searchterm."%' or other_column like '%".$searchterm."%'";
But if you don't know that I would strongly advise going through some sql tutorial...
Also I didn't see anything wrong with this line
echo "$num_found. ".($row['site_name'])." <br />";
What error message are you getting?

Answer 4

Just add 'AND column = "condition"' to the WHERE clause of your query.
Be careful with adding lots of LIKE % conditions as these can be very slow especially if using a front wild card. This causes the RDBMS to search every row. You can optimize if you use an index on the column and only a trailing wildcard.

Answer 5

You are searching the whole table, just limiting the results to those where the site_name like '%".$searchterm."%'. If you want to search everything from that table, you need to remove the WHERE clause
Here's the corrected line. You had a few too many quotes in it.
echo $num_found.".".($row['site_name'])." <br />";

Answer 6

Regarding displaying the message, you have a typo in your code:
// Check if search term was entered.
if (!$serachterm)
should be:
// Check if search term was entered.
if (!$searchterm)
In the code you have written, !$serachterm always evaluates to true because you never declared a variable $seracherm (note the typo).

Answer 7

your code is very bugy for sql injection first do
do this
$searchterm = htmlspecialchars($searchterm);
trim($searchterm);
next
$query = mysql_real_escape_string($query);
finaly your search looks like this
$query = "select * from explore where site_name like '%$searchterm%';