Associated Name spiderweb - mysql

Question

Say for instance I have the following entries in my table:
ID - 1
Name - Daryl
ID - 2
Name - Terry
ID - 3
Name - Dave
ID - 4
Name - Mitch
I eventually wish to search my table(s) for one specific name, but show all associated names. For instance,
Searching Daryl will return Terry, Dave & Daryl.
Searching Terry will return Dave, Daryl & Terry
Searching Mitch will only return Mitch.
The current table housing the names is as followed:
--
-- Table structure for table `members`
--
CREATE TABLE `members` (
`ID` int(255) NOT NULL,
`GuildID` int(255) NOT NULL,
`ToonName` varchar(255) NOT NULL,
`AddedOn` date NOT NULL,
`AddedByID` int(255) NOT NULL
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;
--
-- Dumping data for table `members`
--
INSERT INTO `members` (`ID`, `GuildID`, `ToonName`, `AddedOn`, `AddedByID`) VALUES
(1, 1, 'Daryl', '2020-01-17', 5),
(2, 1, 'Terry', '2020-01-17', 5),
(3, 1, 'Mitch', '2020-01-17', 5),
(4, 1, 'Dave', '2020-01-17', 5);
--
For Reference. GuildID will be a default search criteria based on the searchers login details. With a spiderweb like this, how would I go about creating another table (or another Column) to bring a combined search spiderweb structure based on the search criteria?
I was thinking something along the lines of:
CREATE TABLE `Associated`(
`ID` INT(255) NOT NULL,
`MainID` INT(255) NOT NULL,
`SecondaryID` INT(255) NOT NULL,
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=latin1;
INSERT INTO `Associated` (`ID`, `MainID`, `SecondaryID`) VALUES
(1, 1, 2) -- Daryl Associated With Terry
(2, 1, 4) -- Daryl Associated With Dave
But I feel this will make an over complicated value structure with alot of redundant inputs. Is there a more effective way to create a unified search?
The whole idea of operation is that each name is Individual. So certain Entries can be put under Daryl, Terry acting alone. But one search will bring together all associated Names by searching one name then pull together total entries based on the alisas?

Answer 1

You can try This
Select IFNULL(m.ToonName , members.ToonName) as ToonName
from members
LEFT JOIN Associated on Associated.MainID = members.ID
LEFT JOIN members as m on m.ID = Associated.SecondaryID
Where members.ToonName = "Mitch"
While you have entry for
"Mitch" in Associated table it will return you Daryl and when you dont have associated Id it will return the name from members table.
And If you will check this with "Daryl", it will give you Two results,
Select IFNULL(m.ToonName , members.ToonName) as ToonName
from members
LEFT JOIN Associated on Associated.MainID = members.ID
LEFT JOIN members as m on m.ID = Associated.SecondaryID
Where members.ToonName = "Daryl"
In case you want all the names in a single column you can use GROUP_CONCAT as #flash suggested in another answer.

Answer 2

You can directly get the data from the following SQL statement.
For Individual row
SELECT `members`.ToonName FROM `associated` JOIN `members` ON associated.SecondaryID = members.ID WHERE `associated`.MainID = (SELECT ID FROM `members` WHERE ToonName = 'Daryl');
# Output: **ToonName**
Terry,Dave
Grouping Row
// You can also group all rows by comma from following statement
SELECT GROUP_CONCAT(`members`.ToonName) FROM `associated` JOIN `members` ON associated.SecondaryID = members.ID WHERE `associated`.MainID = (SELECT ID FROM `members` WHERE ToonName = 'Daryl');
# Output: **ToonName**
Terry
Dave

Answer 3

Plan A
Add a column to each member. It is the number (or name) if the one group he/she belongs to. Terry, Dave & Daryl would get one value; Mitch would get a different value. Index the column for efficient lookup of related names.
Plan B
Implement a graph, like you suggested. Some tips: Get rid of id; instead have PRIMARY KEY(MainID, SecondaryID). The is an issue to resolve... This design implies a "directedness" of the relationships: Terry --> Dave, but not necessarily Dave --> Terry. If you want to force it to be reflexive, the force two rows to be inserted or insert the two IDs in an canonical order, but then check both directions.
Also, you need to "walk the graph". This is best done with a Recursive CTE. For that feature, you need MySQL 8.0 or MariaDB 10.2.
Plan C
Without the directedness of B, you run into more difficult issues. One is "cluster analysis". Another is messy paths and loops in the 'graph'. Let's avoid these.

Answer 4

Short Answer: Yes you need a second table Associated and it will not make completed structure.
Below is the query to get the required result
SELECT ID, ToonName,
(
SELECT GROUP_CONCAT(ToonName) FROM Associated
JOIN members child ON SecondaryID = child.ID
WHERE MainID = parent.ID
)
FROM members parent
You can also use join but I think, in this case sub query will be better.
NOTE : your tables need some optimization like remove ID field from Associated table, Add index etc.