Searching Databases and Displaying Results Introduction Search criteria may be drawn from known field values, dynamic form submissions (post arguments), path argument values and/or from page variable values. In this step-by-step tutorial, a keyword search using a form is described. Search results are placed at the location of the mgiSearchDatabase tag on the page with the format that you define in the body of the mgiSearchDatabase tag MGI Tags mgiSearchDatabase Steps Create a database with one or more indexed fields. Create a search form in a text editor. Save the search form. Create a page to display search results and open the page in a text editor. Insert the mgiSearchDatabase tag and parameters. Save the search results page. FTP the search form and search results page to the web server running MGI. View the search form in a browser and perform a search. Step 1: Create a database with one or more indexed fields. Create a database with one or more indexed fields. A field must be indexed in order to use the field for searching or for ordering search results. Get more information about Creating and Populating databases. Step 2: Create a search form in a text editor. Create a keyword search form on your page. Enter a label and a text field. Name the text field "keyword". The name of the text field is the name of the post argument that is created when the text field is submitted using the "post" method. Enter a submit button with the value "Search". Enter HTML <FORM> tags. The form action should be the name of the search results page (which you will create in step 3 - let's call it "results.mgi") and the form method should be "post". <form action="results.mgi" method="post"> <center> <h2>Keyword Search</h2> <p>Enter your keywords in the field below, then click the "Search" button</p> <p>Keywords: <input type="text" name="keyword"> <input type="submit" name="submit" value="Search"></p> </center> </form> This keyword search form will display on the page as: Step 3: Save the search form. Save the search form and name it "search.mgi". Step 4: Create a page to display search results and open the page in a text editor. Create a new page to display search results named "results.mgi" and open the search results page in a text editing program that allows you to view and modify the HTML and code of the page. Step 5: Insert the mgiSearchDatabase tag and parameters. Insert your cursor in the HTML of the search results page where you want the search results to display. Enter the beginning mgiSearchDatabase tag, databaseName parameter, keyFieldName parameter, pageVariableName parameter, orderByField parameter, resultsPerPage parameter and ending mgiSearchDatabase tag. Enter the page parameter and resultVariableName parameter if the number of search results may exceed the specified results per page. The page and resultVariableName parameters are used to construct dynamic "Previous" and "Next" buttons for browsing search results. In the databaseName parameter, enter the case-sensitive name of the database that you wish to search. In the keyFieldName parameter, enter the name of the case-sensitive database field name to search for the value of the post argument that follows. In the pageVariableName parameter, enter the name of the page variable that contains the search criteria for the preceeding key field name search. In this example, a page variable is used to add wildcards to the beginning and end of a keyword search. In the orderByField parameter, enter the case-sensitive name of the database field to use for ordering search results. If this parameter is not included, search results are dispalyed in the order in which they were entered in the database. In the resultsPerPage parameter, enter the number of search results to display on each screen. If this parameter is not included, 25 results are displayed per screen. In the page parameter, enter the number for the set of search results to display. In this example, the page number is dynamically entered by embedding a page variable value. In the resultVariableName parameter, enter the name to prepend to all result page variables that are used to construct dynamic "Previous" and "Next" buttons. In this examples, all result page variables are prepended with "ProductResults" (e.g., "ProductResults_Page). In the body of the mgiSearchDatabase tag, enter text, HTML, and MGI database field placeholders to create a template for the search results. The template is repeated for each search result. To retrieve a database field value, use the placeholder format of &mgiDBFieldEnterFieldNameHere; in the body of the mgiSearchDatabase tag. Each placeholder will be replaced with the specific information in that database field for each result. For example, to include values from the ProductName field, you would enter the following in the body of the mgiSearchDatabase tag: &mgiDBFieldProductName; To display the unique internal database ID for a result, use the field name "MGIIDFIELD".   Any text, HTML or MGI tags that are static (i.e., not repeated for each result) should be kept outside of the mgiSearchDatabase tags.   In this example, visitors enter a keyword into a text field to search the "ProductName" field of the database. Since visitors will not enter the exact full product name as it appears in the database, you must append their search criteria with wildcard searches. To accomplish this, enter an mgiSet tag named "SearchCriteria" above the mgiSearchDatabase tag with the value of the keyword and wildcard searches on both sides of the keyword. Use this page variable as the search criteria in the mgiSearchDatabase tag. If it is possible for the number of search results to exceed the value listed in the resultsPerPage parameter, you must construct dynamic "Previous" and "Next" buttons that allow visitors to browse through different sets of search results. Below the mgiSearchDatabase tags, enter a hidden input for the value of the previous page of results and the value of the next page of results using the result variables (ResultVariableName_PrevPage and ResultVariableName_NextPage). Below the hidden inputs, display a "Previous" button if you are not currently displaying the first set of search results and display a "Next" button if there is more than one page of results available. In addition, enter a hidden input that contains the original search criteria. You must provide this information on each screen of the search results so that mgiSearchDatabase tag can perform a search.   Above the mgiSearchDatabase tags, perform a conditional comparison to determine which set of results should be displayed. If the visitor selected the "Previous" button during a search, then display the previous set of results. If the visitor selected the "Next" button during a search, then display the next set of results. Otherwise, display the first set of results. Set the page value in a variable and embed that variable in the page parameter of the mgiSearchDatabase tag.   In order for the "Previous" and "Next" buttons to function, enter HTML <FORM> tags. The action of the form tag should be the name of the search results page (results.mgi) and the method should be "post".   The following is an example search results page including dynamic "Previous" and "Next" buttons. An mgiSet tag is used before the mgiSearchDatabase tag to add wildcard values to the beginning and end of the keyword search in the example. <form action="results.mgi" method="post"> <mgiComment> Determine which page of results to display </mgiComment> <mgiSet name="PageToDisplay" defaultValue="1"> <mgiInlineIf lhs={mgiPostArgument name="ResultsSet"} relationship="equals" rhs="Prev" then={mgiPostArgument name="PrevPage"}> <mgiInlineIf lhs={mgiPostArgument name="ResultsSet"} relationship="equals" rhs="Next" then={mgiPostArgument name="NextPage"}> </mgiSet> <mgiComment> Perform the search and display the search results </mgiComment> <mgiSet name="SearchCriteria"> <mgiIf lhs={mgiPostArgument name="keyword"} relationship="isNotEmpty"> *<mgiPostArgument name="keyword">* </mgiIf> </mgiSet> <center> <h2>Search Results</h2> <p> <table width="500" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3" border="1"> <tr bgcolor="#eeeeee"> <th>ISBN</th> <th>Title/Description</th> <th>Price</th> </tr> <mgiSearchDatabase databaseName="Products" keyFieldName="ProductName" pageVariableName="SearchCriteria" orderByField="ProductID" resultsPerPage="5" page={mgiGet name="PageToDisplay"} resultVariableName="KeywordResults"> <tr> <td>&mgiDBFieldProductID;</td> <td><b>&mgiDBFieldProductName;</b> <p>&mgiDBFieldProductDescription;</td> <td align="right">$&mgiDBFieldProductPrice;</td> </tr> </mgiSearchDatabase> </table> </p> <mgiComment> Pass search criteria and display dynamic Previous and Next Buttons </mgiComment> <p><input type="hidden" name="keyword" value={mgiPostArgument name="keyword"}> <input type="hidden" name="PrevPage" value={mgiGet name="KeywordResults_PrevPage"}> <input type="hidden" name="NextPage" value={mgiGet name="KeywordResults_NextPage"}> <mgiIf lhs={mgiGet name="KeywordResults_Page"} relationship="greaterThan" rhs="1"> <input type="submit" name="ResultsSet" value="Prev"> </mgiIf> <mgiIf lhs={mgiGet name="KeywordResults_NextPage"} relationship="greaterThan" rhs="0"> <input type="submit" name="ResultsSet" value="Next"> </mgiIf> </center> </form> The first screen of results using the keyword "Cook" would display as: The second set of search results using the keyword "Cook" would display as: Step 6: Save the search results page. Save the changes you have made to the search results page. Step 7: FTP the search form and search results page to the web server running MGI. Upload the search form and search results page to the web server using an FTP program. Step 8: View the search form in a browser and perform a search. View the search form in a web browser. Enter a keyword in the field and click the "Search" button. The results matching your criteria are displayed. If more than 5 results are found, a "Next" button is also displayed. Clicking the "Next" button will display the next set of results.