exporting to mysql to be used in WordPress to seach for data

[SteveAx]

Hello,

I have a possible new client  a sheriff's department... the wordpress site I am pitching is pretty simple.... except for one thing they want.... they want a searchable section for current inmates in their jail... I guess a previous version of their site had a page that listed the inmates... which isn't really what they want but I'll get to that.... so in the past the data was grabbed from their system by FileMaker every 4 hours and uploaded via ftp to a folder on the server that was hosting their website.... it was being formatted as an html file... basically just a table with each inmates info on a row...someone would go to the page and there would be the whole list.... they still want to use FileMaker...

But now instead of displaying an html file with the whole list they want the viewer to be required to search by last name... if no one with that last name is in the most recent data then they should see nothing.... if more than one person with that last name is found they should see a list with first and last name of those that match... that list would link to the inmates info.... if there is just one match then that one inmates info would come up... the info would be basically name, violations, date incarserrated, bail, and maybe the mugshot... Basically they want this: http://www.washoesheriff.com/inmate-search.php (enter ‘smith’ for an example)

The IT guy at my clients location says they can provide the following formats, uploaded via ftp to my shared web hosting server:

*.tab

*.csv

*.dbf

*.mer

*.htm

*.xml

*.xls

*.xlsx

 

The reason they need to do it when the data is grabbed and uploaded to the Web server is that they are not allowed to give direct access to the inmate files for privacy issues... so this way they are in complete control of what info is released.... and I guess laws have changed and the new sheriff doesn't want all the inmates just listed like they were before... he is requiring the search feature to be used instead...

I don't know anything about FileMaker so I am looking for assistance in understanding what can be done to achieve the results requested.

Thanks,

Steve

[dwdata]

Steve,

The chances are the WordPress site uses a mySQL backend for content storage.

My recommendations would be to create a new table in that mySQL database for the inmates and then look into connecting to the DB with FileMaker via ODBC. This way you could have a table in FMP that mirrors the table in mySQL. You would just need to implement synchronization routines to make sure mySQL DB is updated frequently.

Once this is established, then you could handle thewebsite front-end stuff right in the WordPress template set. Sites like this usually have the option to insert PHP scripting snippets.

Good luck!