mysql : search two columns : one column first then second column

Question

I am trying search two columns in a table, ie title and description. but I want to search title first and then description. so all rows that matches title comes first and all rows that matches description comes second

can I implement this using a single SQL query ?

Answer 1

I suppose this should be efficient

SELECT COLA 
(
SELECT TITLE AS COLA, 'T' AS IND
FROM TABLE
UNION ALL
SELECT DESCRIPTION AS COLA, 'D' AS IND
FROM TABLE
)
ORDER BY COLA, IND DESC

Answer 2

You can do a UNION and first search in title and give those values a column with 0 and 1 for description. Then you ORDER BY that column:

SELECT col1,col2,col3 
FROM
(SELECT col1,col2,col3 ,0 AS ord 
 FROM table1 
 WHERE title LIKE "%searchQuery%"
 UNION
 SELECT col1,col2,col3, 1
 FROM table1 
 WHERE description LIKE "%searchQuery%" 
) a
ORDER BY ord ASC;

This way, records that matched in title will appear first.

Answer 3

You can also use a case statement so it doesn't have to go through the whole table twice.

SELECT col1,col2,col3,
   Case 
   WHEN title LIKE '%searchQuery%' THEN 0
   WHEN description LIKE '%searchQuery%' THEN 1
   END
   AS ord
FROM table1 
WHERE ord is not null
ORDER BY ord;