[ic] HTdig or Googling a local IC Site for better search results on numerous columns

[Barry Treahy, Jr.]

Mike Heins wrote:

>Quoting Barry Treahy, Jr. (Treahy at mmaz.com):
>  
>
>>Has anyone assembled an integrated search or advanced search feature 
>>into IC that would better handle keyword searches across a large number 
>>of columns in a MySQL database?  At present, the method I'm doing are 
>>searches against INDEX columns on some of the key fields and then 
>>attempting to reduce that, but the flexibility sucks and the performance 
>>is even worse;  I'm 4.8.6. 
>>    
>>
>
>Why aren't you using Interchange's text search? It does this type of thing
>pretty well, certainly better than what you can construct with a SQL query.
>
>All that is required is that you export to a text file.
>  
>
Ok, I suspect that I'm already doing some of this, please correct me if 
I'm wrong.  My products.mysql file has INDEX'd numerous columns, of 
which when the table is loaded, verions of products.txt.# and soft links 
from the column name back to the representing column number exist. 

That said, it doesn't appear that I'm using the same form syntax but 
rather the mv_searchspec stuff.  So, a couple questions then.  Creating 
a little test example using the a modified version of the advancedsearch 
as a template, and with a little variable name differing from the 
example on page 5.6, I'm still having problems.  Specifically:

              <br><big><b>Advanced Search</b></big><br><br>
              <form action="[area search]" method=post>
                <input type=hidden name=mv_session_id value="[data 
session id]">
                <INPUT TYPE=hidden NAME=mv_matchlimit VALUE=[control 
matches 10]>
                <table>
                  <tr>
                    <td>
                      <b>Search by Field:</b><br>
                      Search for <input type="text" name=search_string> 
in the
                      <select name=search_column>
                        <option value="sku">Model #
                        <option value="title">Description
                        <option value="oldsku">Old Midwest Model #
                        <option value="related">Industry/Related Model #
                      </select> field.
                      <input type=hidden name="mv_sql_query"
                        value="SELECT code FROM products WHERE
                                                               oldsku 
LIKE search_string">
                      <input type="image" alt="Search" 
src="__THEME_IMG_DIR__search.gif" border=0>

returns in the results pages pages of blank screens, which I presume is 
because the [search-list] in results is behaving differently becuase of 
this different query.  Additionally, if I replace the:

oldsku LIKE search_string

with

search_column LIKE search_string

I get nothing, forget that I need to compound the search query and would 
also like to 'limit' it so a reasonable max and the match limit appears 
to be ignored.

>If your database is so huge that you are going to externally index you
>should probably try to leverage swish-e (which has an IC module) or
>mNoGoSearch or something.
>  
>
Don't know how huge is too big, but there is over 20k SKU's and the are 
52 columns in my products table of which about 40 could be searched on, 
and of those 40, the meaning of their value differs based on the product 
category...

Best regards,

Barry

-- 

Barry Treahy, Jr                       E-mail: Treahy at MMaz.com
Midwest Microwave                          Phone: 480/314-1320
Vice President & CIO                         FAX: 480/661-7028