fuzzy DISTINCT Values
- by user982853
I have a database of real estate listings and need to return a list of neighborhoods. Right now I am using mysql DISTINCT which returns all of the distinct values. My probelm is that there is a lot of neighborhoods that have similar names: example:
Park View Sub 1
Park View
Park View Sub 2
Park View Sub 3
Great Lake Sub 1
Great Lake Sub 2
Great Lake
Great Lake Sub 3
I am looking for an easy php or mysql solution that would recognize that "Park View" and "Great Lake" already exists and ONLY return "Park View" and "Great Lake".
My initial thought is to some how get the sort order by length so that the short values are at the top and then loop through using strstr. This sound like a large task I am wondering if there is a function either in mysql or php that would easily do this.