PDA

View Full Version : PHPDig or MySQL Full Text ?

Korben
03-23-2004, 10:28 AM
Hello everyone,

I am looking for a powerful indexer/search engine for my website and PHPDig seems to have everything I need.

I also "digged" into the MySQL doc and saw that MySQL has support for full-text indexing and searching and allows boolean search.

Has anyone benchmarked the two solutions and can show me the best way to go : PhpDig or MySQL Full Text ? What do you think ?

Thanks !

Cheers,

Korben
jerrywin5
03-24-2004, 01:55 AM
It appears that PHPDig uses a hand coded version of full-text search rather than the MySQL Full-text Search feature. Will you please take some time and explain why? How do they compare?

Thank you!
Charter
03-24-2004, 09:21 AM
Hi. The MATCH AGAINST capabilites were introduced in the MySQL 3.23.23 version, do not allow for partial word matching, and exclude results where keyword can be found in over half of the rows. The IN BOOLEAN MODE capabilites were introduced in MySQL 4.0.1 and are not available in MySQL 3.23.x versions. MySQL 4.0.x reached production level in the spring of 2003, and there are many users who still utilize MySQL 3.23.x versions. PhpDig was written to store keywords and use those keywords to pull results from text files. This circumvents certain limits with MATCH AGAINST queries and avoids using LIKE queries on pages of text. When MySQL 4.x.x becomes the standard package for all MySQL users, PhpDig would need major changes in order to make use of IN BOOLEAN MODE capabilities.
jerrywin5
03-24-2004, 10:51 AM
What else can you tell us about how they compare?

If each were searching against the same database, which would return search results faster and why?

Which method will start to slow down faster as the number of files indexed grows and why?

Are you saying that once MySQL 4.x.x becomes standard for users that PHPDig will be converted to implement MySQL's Full-Text Search instead of the current method?
Charter
03-24-2004, 11:59 PM
Hi. As I haven't written a MATCH AGAINST version of PhpDig, I am unable to provide benchmark information for comparison. MySQL 4.x.x as standard does not guarantee a new release of PhpDig.