What are some best practices for implementing a search function in PHP for a website?

Implementing a search function in PHP for a website involves creating a form where users can input their search query, processing the input to retrieve relevant results from a database, and displaying the results in a user-friendly manner. It's important to sanitize user input to prevent SQL injection attacks and to optimize the search query for better performance. 

<?php

// Assuming you have a database connection established

if(isset($_GET['search'])) {
    $search = $_GET['search'];

    // Sanitize the input
    $search = mysqli_real_escape_string($conn, $search);

    // Perform a search query
    $sql = "SELECT * FROM your_table WHERE column_name LIKE '%$search%'";
    $result = mysqli_query($conn, $sql);

    // Display search results
    while($row = mysqli_fetch_assoc($result)) {
        echo $row['column_name'] . "<br>";
    }
}

?>

<form method="GET" action="">
    <input type="text" name="search" placeholder="Search...">
    <button type="submit">Search</button>
</form>

Keywords

PHP search function website implementation best practices

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