How to make the most relevant search with MySQL? - mysql

Question

I want to do a search based on its relevance to MySQL. Whatever I tried, I could not succeed. I did a Fulltext search, I did a search with Like, again I can not do the following order.
Search word for example this: "first second"
First Second Keyword -> (full word) will begin with
Keyword First Second Keyword -> (full word) in between or at the end
Firstsecond Keyword -> (adjacent word) will begin with
Keyword Firstsecond Keyword -> (adjacent word) in between or at the end
First Keyword -> (only the first word) will begin with
Keyword First Keyword -> (only the first word) in between or at the end
Second Keyword -> (only the second word) will begin with
Keyword Second Keyword -> (only the second word) in between or at the end
Then I want it to continue as below; (all of them)
Firstasdasd Keyword
Keyword asdasdfirst Keyword
Keyword asdasdfirstasdasd Keyword
Secondasdasd Keyword
Keyword asdasdsecond Keyword
Keyword asdasdsecondasdasd Keyword

Answer 1

Yeah, FULLTEXT won't do this kind of search. It's word-oriented.
What you want isn't really simple SQL. I think you want something like this to hit the first keyword.
SET #match := 'first'
SELECT MIN(priority) priority, value
FROM (
SELECT 1 priority, value FROM tbl WHERE value LIKE CONCAT(#match, ' %')
UNION ALL
SELECT 2 priority, value FROM tbl WHERE value LIKE CONCAT('% ', #match, ' %')
UNION ALL
SELECT 3 priority, value FROM tbl WHERE value LIKE CONCAT('%', #match, '%')
) results
GROUP BY value
ORDER BY MIN(priority), value;
Generally, you use a UNIONed series of SELECTs with priorities for the full-word and embedded word matches, and take the lowest priority match you get for each row.
You'll need to elaborate on that general kind of pattern to handle both keywords. This looks like it could turn into a real pain in the xxx neck to get right. And the LIKE '%something' search terms mean it won't be very fast.
If you're going to large scale with this, it might be worth investigating Sphinx.