Combine PHP prepared statments with LIKE

Anyone know how to combine PHP prepared statements with LIKE? i.e.

"SELECT * FROM table WHERE name LIKE %?%";

From stackoverflow

• The % signs need to go in the variable that you assign to the parameter, instead of in the query.

  I don't know if you're using mysqli or PDO, but with PDO it would be something like:

  $st = $db->prepare("SELECT * FROM table WHERE name LIKE ?");
  $st->execute(array('%'.$test_string.'%'));
  

• You can use the concatenation operator of your respective sql database:

  # oracle
  SELECT * FROM table WHERE name LIKE '%' || :param || '%'
  # mysql
  SELECT * from table WHERE name LIKE CONCAT('%', :param, '%')
  

  I'm not familar with other databases, but they probably have an equivalent function/operator.

  St. John Johnson : That won't work with strings. It will throw warnings about non-integers.

  Chad Birch : He's probably coming from an Oracle background, that's the Oracle concatenation operator, but in MySQL it's the OR operator. In MySQL you'd have to do CONCAT('%', ?, '%')

  Richard Levasseur : ah, noted! I haven't used mysql in years.

• You could try something like this:

  "SELECT * FROM table WHERE name LIKE CONCAT(CONCAT('%',?),'%')"