PHP Search engine using two input fields

Question

I've been learning PHP in my free time for a couple of weeks and this is the first problem I have had to ask help with. I've searched all over the internet but have found nothing I can fully understand when it comes to having a PHP mysql search engine with two input fields.

I have a search engine, which has two input fields, one field is for entering the kind of business one is looking for. The second field is for entering the location which one is trying to find the business in.

Could someone awesome and highly intelligent please tell me how do I get:

The first input field to search through my business column in my MySql table & the second input field to search through my location column in my MySql table.

I am using the FULLTEXT search engine method.

Here is the form snippet: (I know it's really sloppy, and probably unsafe but I plan on fixing that later.)

<form id="tfnewsearch" method="get" action="search.php">
   <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
      <tr>
         <td>
            <table width="476" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
               <tr valign="middle">
                  <td width="476" class="">
                     <div id="tfheader2">
                        <table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
                           <tr>
                              <td width="91%">
                                 <table width="472" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0">
                                    <tr>
                                       <td width="4">&nbsp;</td>
                                       <td width="139"><input style="width:210px" type="text" id="tfq" class="tftextinput2" name="business" size="20" maxlength="40" value="Business e.g. Insurance" onClick="if(this.value == 'Business e.g. Insurance') this.value='';" /></td>
                                       <td width="5">&nbsp;</td>
                                       <td width="69"><input  style="width:210px" type="text" id="tfq2" class="tftextinput2" name="location" size="20" maxlength="40" value="Location e.g. Hamilton" onClick="if(this.value == 'Location e.g. Hamilton') this.value='';" /></td>
                                       <td width="4">&nbsp;</td>
                                       <td>
                                          <input style="width:40px" type="image" src="site_images/q.png" alt="Search" class="tfbutton2" name="submit" value="&gt;" />
                                       </td>
                                       <td width="10">&nbsp;</td>
                                    </tr>
                                 </table>
                              </td>
                           </tr>
                        </table>
                        <div class="tfclear"></div>
                     </div>
                  </td>
               </tr>
            </table>
         </td>
      </tr>
   </table>
</form>

Here is the php snippet:

$button = @$_GET['submit'];
$search1 = @$_GET['business'];
$search2 = @$_GET['location'];

$strSQL = "SELECT * FROM users WHERE region = $search1 AND city = $search2";

$query = mysqli_query($con, $strSQL);
while ($result = mysqli_fetch_array($query));

if ($result = mysqli_query($con, $strSQL))

    $foundnum = mysqli_num_rows($result);

if ($foundnum == 0)

If you need more info please let me know.

Answer 1

You should use ticks (') when binding variables to your query.

$strSQL = "SELECT * FROM users WHERE region = '$search1' AND city = '$search2'";

And in order to get the results, you can fetch them using mysqli_fetch_array(). Here is an example:

$query = mysqli_query($con, $strSQL); /* EXECUTE FIRST THE QUERY */
while($result = mysqli_fetch_array($query)){
  echo $result["column1"]." ".$result["column2"]."<br>"; /* REPLACE NECESSARY COLUMN NAMES */
}

You should also consider using *_real_escape_string() to prevent some SQL injections before you bind them to your query.

$search1 = mysqli_real_escape_string($con, $_GET['business']);

Instead of value tags for your Business e.g. Insurance, you can just use placeholder so you won't have to include the onClick="" tag.

<input type="text" id="tfq" class="tftextinput2" name="business" size="20" maxlength="40" style="width:210px" placeholder="Business e.g. Insurance"/>

You should also look at prepared statement while you are at it.