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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-06-01T15:52:04+00:00

I have a table with images and tags in it (called tbl_images ) image_file

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I have a table with images and tags in it (called tbl_images)

image_file    image_tags
----------    ----------------------------
test.png      tag1 another_tag tag2
hi.jpg        tag9 tag1 another_tag qwerty

How would I do it so that:

  • searching ‘another’ returns nothing
  • searching ‘tag1’ returns the test.png row
  • searching ‘tag1 another_tag’ returns the test.png row
  • searching ‘qwerty tag2’ returns nothing

?

As in, the ability to search using the full tag name and to search multiple tags at the same time if they all occur in the same image_tags field in the same row.
Note:-

  • I’m only searching within one field
  • Its being done with a PHP search input (retrieved in $_GET['search_terms'])
  • I can’t do LIKE '%tag9% because tag9 could appear in a larger tag, such as Atag98, and as I said I would only like the exact tag match.
  • I can’t do LIKE ' tag9 ' (note the space before and after,) because tag9 may appear at the beginning of the image_tags field (where there is no space, so there would be no match)
  • I can’t do LIKE 'tag9 another_tag' because I don’t know if another_tag comes after tag9, similarly I can’t do LIKE 'tag9%another_tag' for the same reason; also tag9 could be part of a larger tag (as mentioned previously.)

Also, is fulltext search appropriate for this? And if so, could you provide an example please?

A tricky problem (for me anyway;) any help would be greatly appreciated.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    A better solution to store tags with images would be to create a separate table where tags are linked to images. You would then create a row for each tag, e.g.

    image_file (FK)  tag
---------------  -----------
test.png         tag1
test.png         another_tag
test.png         tag2
hi.jpg           tag9
hi.jpg           tag1
hi.jpg           another_tag
hi.jpg           qwerty

    You can then simply look up which tags are related to an image:

    SELECT tag FROM tags WHERE image_file = 'test.png'

    or which images are related to a certain tag:

    SELECT image_file FROM tags WHERE tag = 'tag1'

    All problems with LIKE which you described in your question are avoided using this approach. Full-text search is not needed when normalizing your database like this.

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