CODEWITHSUNDEEP
phpmysqlsearchquery-string
sonarbiscuit
sonarbiscuit

Reputation: 5

How to combine a search box and dropdown to output results (php, mysql)

I have created an HTML form with a search box and a drop down list of 50 states in the USA. What I want is to let the user type in a keyword in the search box (email, subject, username, etc.) and select a state from the drop down. By selecting a state from the drop down, I want my PHP code to find the keyword from the search box only in that selected state. For example as a user, I would like to find "soccer" in the state of Washington and see a list of results.

In other words, how would I display results only in the selected state combined with my search form?

Here is a bit of my PHP code to give you all an idea of what I'm trying to accomplish. 

// this is pulling the text that was typed in the html search box
$searchbox = $_POST['searchbox'];

// this is pulling the state from my HTML drop down menu
$state = $_POST['state'];

$searchboxresult = mysql_query("
  SELECT *
  FROM   table
  WHERE (ID      LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (stateID LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (city    LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (subject LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (email   LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (posting LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (skill   LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (event   LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (days    LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
     OR (url     LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')
");

// and

$statedropdownresult = mysql_query("
  SELECT * FROM table WHERE stateID LIKE '%$state%'
");

Then I have a while loop that searches for everything and outputs the data. But I can't get the states drop down to limit what the user is searching for. I can only get one or the other mysql_query to work in combination with my while loop, not both. For some reason, combining the queries into one using AND doesn't seem to work either. Any ideas?

I know that the code is sloppy and there are security issues, however I will be going through to do a cleanup later on. If you need more details or clarification on something, I would be happy elaborate more!

Upvotes: 0

Views: 2889

Answers (1)

user1163513
user1163513

Reputation: 4217

You could try something like this:-

$sql ="SELECT * FROM table WHERE 1";

if($_POST['searchbox'] != ''){
     $sql =" and (ID LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (stateID LIKE              
     '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (city LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR   
     (subject LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (email LIKE  
     '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (posting LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR  
     (skill LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (event LIKE  
     '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (days LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%') OR (url  
     LIKE '%".$_POST['searchbox']."%')";
}
if($state != ''){
    $sql .= " and stateID LIKE '%".$state."%'";
}

  mysql_query($sql);

Hope this helps.

Upvotes: 1

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