Can PHP/MySQL perform a "Site Search" feature?

**jawn_tech** · #1 (**permalink**) 08-19-2004, 12:55 PM

Hello!

I know nothing about CGI other than I need to start. My experience has been making static sites and uploading them to a public_html folder on our host.

I now work for a company, and we launched a new website I created. To get things going, I used an external 'site search' (result pages have ads, etc). The former site had its own site search, which I believes uses CGI. I notice there is a folder on our server called "cgi-bin".

What do I need to get started? I hate to say it, I'm looking for some kind of tutorial that really approaches it 'hand holding' start to finish for a total novice to get a site search feature up and running.

cyanide · #2 (**permalink**) 08-20-2004, 12:28 PM

Well, personally, I'm not a big fan of cgi.
php might be the better way to go.

You can start here

**jawn_tech** · #3 (**permalink**) 08-20-2004, 01:42 PM

I need to add a site-search functionality to our website. I know nothing about PHP and MySQL, but hear it's a better way to go than cgi (which is also foreign to me).

Can it be done with PHP? If so, can someone point me to some 'for dummies'-style instructions?

**jawn_tech** · #4 (**permalink**) 08-20-2004, 01:46 PM

Thanks, cyanide, you rock!

I overlooked your link you provided right in front of my nose and started a new topic asking for PHP help. I didn't mean to be redundant -- unless someone else wants to post something additional...

cyanide · #5 (**permalink**) 08-20-2004, 01:57 PM

No Problem !
I merged your 2 threads

Good Luck !

deekins · #6 (**permalink**) 08-20-2004, 06:08 PM

We’ve recently undergone some major revisions on our site, most significantly was implementing php across the site. This allowed us to perform advanced sorts, and has decreased the time involved with maintenance and further revisions.

The one downside of this switch is the fact that our previous site-wide search capability has disappeared. For reusability, there is nothing coded in html (which a typical site search crawl utility would pick up) that uniquely identifies or makes the pages unique. We have a page id html coded, which the php code uses to go to our backend db to serve up the relevant page copy.

Does anyone have experience with this type of setup, and have found a good way around it? Possibly you have knowledge of some good free site-search engines, which utilize php, and ultimately, render up a search results page off of querying a mySql database. I’ve poked around a bit, but have not found anything viable.

Thanks for any help.

paulhiles · #7 (**permalink**) 08-23-2004, 08:30 PM

Hi deekins,

I've added your post to this existing thread, hope that's okay. cyanide's link to script examples on the Hotscripts site looks like a useful starting point... so here it is again! :o)

http://www.hotscripts.com/PHP/Script...nes/index.html