PHP/SQL Check if a similar entry already exists in the database

Question

I have a search on my website and im trying to show a list of the most popular search terms on my site it sort of works but it isn't matching the strings close enough.

This is what i'm currently using:

$sql = "SELECT * FROM db WHERE r_name LIKE '%".$searchname."%' OR r_number like '%".$searchname."%'

However if a user searches for say Game Name and another searches for Game Name (Reviews) it will add 2 entries into my database, Is there a way to do a similarity test before entering the entry ?

Answer 1

yes, there is a way but it requires you to fiddle with it a little. there is a search called SOUNDEX, which will match things that are very close. It might not be a perfect solution to your question, but it is definitely something that might get you started in the right direction.

SELECT * FROM db WHERE SOUNDEX( db.r_name ) LIKE SOUNDEX( '{$searchname}' );

I believe that if you have an entry 'lowercasexd' , and do soundex like('what is lowercasexd?'), it will find the entry that's associated with 'lowercasexd'. Be aware that this type of search take a little while to run compare to '=' searches on indexed databases(on my database it does about 5-6k entries per second) so it is NOT recommended for anything big. If you want a near-perfect solution, I suggest you read about google's search mechanism, and look up some search engine source code if your project is significant enough.