So how do you take that search form with multiple fields and use it to efficiently query your database for matching records?

The simple way is just to take whatever the user did or didn't enter into a field and match it against a database field.

Suppose, for example, that you have the field title and a form element of the same name. You might do something like this:

query = "SELECT * FROM data WHERE title LIKE '%" & Request.Form("title") & "%'"

But what if the user didn't enter a value for the title field?

It's a bit of a waste to match blank values. And what if you want something a bit more complex than a straight-forward match.

For example, the plus ( ) and minus (-) syntax that is common on web search engines these days, for including and exluding words, respectively.

This Perl Script handles these scenarios, for searching through a database of messages.