How to store search criteria or search results? - php

I have a php classifieds website (mostly) and I am currently using MYSQL as a database.
Later on I will use SOLR or maybe Sphinx as a "search engine".
I want to make it possible for users to view "results" of searches they have made before, but I don't know where to start...
How is this done?
Currently I have a form which is filled in and when submitted, the php just checks agains a mysql table to see if there are any matches.
Should I store the 'Search criteria' and do a new search every time the users click on one of their previous searches, or should I store the results? I would prefer to make a new search because new items may have been inserted since the last search!
If you need more input, just let me know and I will update this Q.
Thanks

Well... if you're basically talking about "saved searches", I'm doing something similar currently so that I just have a separate table where....
saved_search_id (primary) | user_id (foreign) | search_name | criteria1 | criteria2 | criteria3 ... etc
So basically I can now display to the user a list of saved searches they've created, and the table stores the criteria that were part of that search. I can then use those saved criteria to run a saved search anytime.
Does that help?

Use query-string parameters ($_GET) for the search form. Then the user can bookmark the search. If you want, you could create a bookmarking feature in your application, but there really is no need.
If you are concerned about performance, make sure that your database' cache settings are tuned correctly, and that you don't write too often to the table. MySql will do a good job of caching then.

You already have said it: if users should see the new results of old queries, you'll have to store the search parameters somehow and re-do the search when a users requests it.

Store the search criteria. This is quite obivious as if the data changes users will get old results. And consider the space the results might take after a while :)
I would also consider really storing the search criteria not the actual query. If you change the database the stored searches would still work as you need to update the query generation engine also but you would most likely forgot to update every stored query.

Related

How to sync MySQL database with solr automatically

I've a database which updates very frequently and I would like solr to synchronise it automatically.
I've 20+ tables but I want my search should be work in only 2 tables and only in some specific field only.
I've put some data manually in solr and run it with get api.
http://127.0.0.1:8983/solr/gettingstarted/select?indent=on&q=:&wt=json
and it works perfectly fine.
can we also do something like if my 'X' users search somethings and in another table I'll check that if post is made by 'X' and his friends then only returns that otherwise not I mean can we get data with conditions as well ?
Please provide some link or resource or any related reference or solution regarding it.
TIA
There is no automagic syncing in Solr. You'll either have to send the updates to Solr yourself (through the regular POST interface), or trigger a deltaimport through the DataImportHandler if that's what you're using.
For your second case - the answer depends - but the most straight forward way is to include a list of valid usernames or user_ids in your query and then filter against that list (in a fq=posted_by:(foo OR bar OR baz OR ...). This is limited by the number of boolean clauses in your solrconfig.

Trying to build a search engine for my website

I am trying to find the best way to create a search engine for my website. All of the items that need to be searched are in the mysqli database, but I also have tables in the database that need to be excluded from the search (ie. Users information, navigation menu tables, etc). The only solution that I have come up with so far is to search each table individually for that key word and then display the results.
Is there an easier way to do this? I would like to have a ‘table group’ or something like that so my query could be something like:
SELECT * FROM table_group WHERE any_column LIKE “%search_string%”
The database has around 30 tables right now, but tables can be dynamically added and this will grow as the site is used more. What is the best way to go about this?
If you want to pursuit the idea of creating a search engine querying to the database, I think you have to query for the metadata of the database: the list of tables and the list of fields each table has.
However, this is difficult to follow because at the end you have to present the information to the user in a printable view: it isn't the same finding a proper name (and hence you have to present the page userInfo.php -to say an example- to the user) or a name of the company (and therefore you have to present a totally different page.
I think at least you have to create search elements based on the pages you have in the application. This means that you have to create a table with the information for the search engine: how to present this information, in what tables/fields should it search, etc.
Even if there will be tricks. What if the user searchs for "smyth"?? Have the search engine be smart enough to return "smith"?? And if you have two fields, one with the name and other wit the surname, what will happen the user types "john smith"??

PHP + MySQL cascading searches from linked query results

Apologies in advance for the wall of text; not sure if this is possible but i thought i'd ask. I've looked online and can't quite find what i want. I have been learning a lot of PHP and MySQL and am at the stage where i am starting to write my own database driven websites. A freely available database i have been practicing with is the eve_sdd_crucible_11 database which is freely available from the game website. I have been using it because it's huge and requires the use of a lot of different skills to get the most out of it.
I would like to do a simple database for exploration. This database queries the main one for information, creates a new table based on the search results and also allows the user to add their own comments on what they have found. I have the various queries ready to go but because i don't want a massive user interface, i want to keep the user side as clean as possible. This app needs to query and display results from the 'mapregions', 'mapconstellations', 'mapsolarsystems' and 'mapdenormalize' tables and insert this information into a new database with the retrieved info plus a comment box for each entity.
Now the preamble is done, this is what i am looking to do:
Query 'mapregions' (region name returns region ID to be used in next query) and display results (linked)->
click on linked result, query 'mapconstellations' (constellation name returns constellation ID to be used in next query) and display results (linked)->
click on linked result, query 'mapsolarsystems' (solar system name returns solar system ID to be used in next query) and display results (linked) ->
click on linked result, query 'mapdenormalise' and display all entities in that system -> Inject content into new database along with comment boxes per listed entity.
Like i said earlier in the post, i have the queries set up ready to go, i have the beginnings of the php for the page but i am stuck on how to link these displayed results to the next query in the chain. All results have to display the name of the entity and it's the entity's corresponding ID number that is used to execute the next query in the chain.
Not sure if i've explained it particularly well, but it's the best i can do at this time of night... Any help or pointers would be vastly appreciated as it's starting to do my head in ;)
Need to look into joins - from reading through that text, it seems like you're missing a basic understanding of how to join tables - your 4th paragraph, to me, sounds like it should be a single query.
Creating a new database and/or table per search shows that you might still be missing some of the fundamentals - as that approach would never scale and would be a nightmare to manage.
Start reading up on mysql joins: Mysql Joins and go from there, looking at other examples of how joins work and real world examples - that will hugely affect how you continue building this.

Display latest search results from MySQL with PHP

Google unfortunately didn't seem to have the answers I wanted. I currently own a small search engine website for specific content using PHP GET.
I want to add a latest searches page, meaning to have each search recorded, saved, and then displayed on another page, with the "most searched" at the top, or even the "latest search" at the top.
In short: Store my latest searches in a MySQL database (or anything that'll work), and display them on a page afterwards.
I'm guessing this would best be accomplished with MySQL, and then I'd like to output it in to PHP.
Any help is greatly appreciated.
Recent searches could be abused easily. All I have to do is to go onto your site and search for "your site sucks" or worse and they've essentially defaced your site. I'd really think about adding that feature.
In terms of building the most popular searches and scaling it nicely I'd recommend:
Log queries somewhere. Could be a MySQL db table but a logfile would be more sensible as it's a log.
Run a script/job periodically to extract/group data from the log
Have that periodic script job populate some table with the most popular searches
I like this approach because:
A backend script does all of the hard work - there's no GROUP BY, etc made by user requests
You can introduce filtering or any other logic to the backend script and it doesn't effect user requests
You don't ever need to put big volumes of data into the database
Create a database, create a table (for example recent_searches) and fields such as query (the query searched) and timestamp (unix timestamp that the query was made) said, then for your script your MySQL query will be something like:
SELECT * FROM `recent_searches` ORDER BY `timestamp` DESC LIMIT 0, 5
This should return the 5 most recent searches, with the most recent one appearing first.
Create table (something named like latest_searches) with fields query, searched_count, results_count.
Then after each search (if results_count>0), check, if this search query exists in that table. And update or insert new line into table.
And on some page you can just use data from this table.
It's pretty simple.
Ok, your question is not yet clear. But I'm guessing that you mean you want to READ the latest results first.
To achieve this, follow these steps:
When storing the results use an extra field to hold DATETIME. So your insert query will look like this:
Insert into Table (SearchItem, When) Values ($strSearchItem, Now() )
When retrieving, make sure you include an order by like this:
Select * from Table Order by When Desc
I hope this is what you meant to do :)
You simply store the link and name of the link/search in MySQL and then add a timestamp to record what time sb searched for them. Then you pull them out of the DB ordered by the timestamp and display them on the website with PHP.
Create a table with three rows: search link timestamp.
Then write a PHP script to insert rows when needed (this is done when the user actually searches)
Your main page where you want stuff to be displayed simply gets the data back out and puts them into a link container $nameOfWebsite
It's probably best to use a for/while loop to do step 3
You could additionally add sth like a counter to know what searches are the most popular / this would be another field in MySQL and you just keep updating it (increasing it by one, but limited to the IP)

Where to store search matches in cakephp?

I am writing an app in cakephp that will perform scheduled searches for users and store the search results in a matches table. My question is do I really need this matches model in cakephp to store the results? If the answer is no, how should I store the results?
Happy new year.
There are many ways to store data and the one you choose will depend on the data itself and the use to which it will be put (and when it will be used). Because you are doing scheduled searches, I assume that the user may not be around when the search is done, in which case the result needs to be stored.
In this case, I'd use the database. If you need to keep historical results this is definitely the way to go. If the results can be overwritten, you could use a text file per user, but that might get messy.
You don't need to use the main database - you could have another MySql, for example or even a totally different one such as a flat file db.
What would I do? I'd use a table in the main database and get on with something else.

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