MySQL MATCH doesn't work with two characters?

Question

Hi,

I have a table called 'business' with the following sample data:

Street - 150 N Michigan Ave.
City - Chicago
State - IL
Zip - 60601

When I run a query like

SELECT business.* 
    WHERE MATCH(business.Street, business.City, business.State, business.Zip)
                AGAINST('*150*' IN BOOLEAN MODE)
-- IT WORKS


SELECT business.* 
    WHERE MATCH(business.Street, business.City, business.State, business.Zip)
                AGAINST('*Chicago*' IN BOOLEAN MODE)
-- IT WORKS


SELECT business.* 
    WHERE MATCH(business.Street, business.City, business.State, business.Zip)
                AGAINST('*60601*' IN BOOLEAN MODE)
-- IT WORKS


SELECT business.* 
    WHERE MATCH(business.Street, business.City, business.State, business.Zip)
                AGAINST('*IL*' IN BOOLEAN MODE)
-- DOESNT WORK!!

So what's wrong with the last query?

Any ideas?

Answer 1

Looks like you're running into the minimum length limit, as stated in the MySQL docs.

Answer 2

Update the ft_min_word_len variable in the my.cnf MySQL configuration file:

[mysqld]
ft_min_word_len=N

Note that afterwards indexes must be rebuilt.