Search Engine in DW?

[tomcausland]

Hi all,

I am creating a website and I want it to have a search engine to search all of the text on the site; however, I will be using a lot of material that will be dynamic text from a database I will host online as well.

So with all this dynamic text how will a typical search engine you build into your site cope with this? My understanding of dynamic text/tables is the page is only created when someone links to it. First it needs to access the database then the result of the page and the accessed data the webpage is loaded online in its totality.

I see other sites with Google on the site... I only want the search engine to search on my site and I do not want a third party's details on my site.

Is it possible to create a Boolean search engine in DW that uses: and; or; and; and ()? Is there code that has already been written for this purpose?

In what way can I use Dreamweaver to incorporate this search engine into my site?

How much coding would this require and what is the stability of something like this when it is online and being hosted?

Please do not post the code at this time. But, I would really appreciate help in working out how feasible it is for DW to do all of this.

Warm regards,

T.

[Nancy OShea]

Have a look at Zoom Website Search from Wrensoft.

http://www.wrensoft.com/zoom/

Nancy O.
Alt-Web Design & Publishing
Web | Graphics |  Print | Media Specialists
www.alt-web.com/
www.twitter.com/altweb

[tomcausland]

Hey Nancy,

Well, it looks the ticket. I've yet to get my hosting sorted out; however, I have to say after watching the little Flash video explaining how it works it looks good.

If it did all it claims to do it looks really good value.

How stable and robust is a website when you start adding things like this to the code? I guess I would just add it in like a Flash video?

Warm thanks for answering.

T.

[BrianNardone]

I've used Zoom Search engine by Wrensoft for a few years now. It is stable, intuitive, fast, fun, exceptionally useful and just a top quality product. Those Aussies really did this right. Have no fear of this one. Just dive in and do it.

[tomcausland]

Dear Brian,

It is downloaded and ready to go.

I am really concentrating on the text content on my website and search will be important so Zoom looks great.

Very easy to use as well if the training video is anything to go by.

Thank again for your answer.

T.

[David_Powers · Accepted solution]

If your content is stored in a MySQL database, you can use a FULLTEXT index to make it searchable. See the MySQL manual for details: http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/fulltext-search.html.

[tomcausland]

Dear David,

Yes, the database will be SQL, and also part of what I think is called an open source database programme.

I have looked on your site and I really feel in the deep end; however, here to learn so bring it on!

I will look through the code and I am already starting to focus more on the code than the authoring platform in DW.

Thanks David!

T.