[MYSQL & PHP] Searching two tables

Question

I currently have following two tables:

**files_list**
-listid
-name
-synonym
-description

**files_tags**
-tag_name
-listid

If someone uses the keyword "dragon ball", at the moment, I use following query to search my_list for possible matches:

**SELECT * FROM `files_list` WHERE ( name LIKE '%dragon%' OR synonym LIKE '%dragon%' OR description LIKE '%dragon%' OR name LIKE '%ball%' OR synonym LIKE '%ball%' OR description LIKE '%ball%' )**

I am not sure how to search both tables using one query. I want to show the user following data in the search result: name, synonym, description and all tags.

My Questions 1. Is there any way to make the current mysql query shorter? 2. How can I combine it with files_tags table, - to show rows from files_list which has a match in files_tags, but not in files_list? - to show rows from files_list which has a match in files_list, but may not in files_tags`?

You can see the current displayed result at http://hsbsitez.com/

Answer 1

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/394041/mysql-how-to-search-multiple-tables-for-a-string-existing-in-any-column

See this question your answer is there :)

Answer 2

Be careful when using union to actually get the columns you want for each unioned query. And this case, a subquery seems to make more sense:

SELECT name, synonym, description FROM files_list WHERE
       name LIKE '%dragon%' OR synonym LIKE '%dragon%' OR description LIKE '%dragon%'
       OR name LIKE '%ball%' OR synonym LIKE '%ball%' OR description LIKE '%ball%'
       OR listid IN (SELECT listid FROM files_tags WHERE tag_name='dragon' OR tag_name='ball');

Some additional questions: When you say you want show the user "all tags", do you mean all tags that exist for a given listid? Or just those that matched? And if description like "%dragon%", is dragon one of the tags you want returned even if it isn't in file_tags?