Looking for the searchable database plugin WordPress users can rely on? This WP database plugin has everything you need and more!
Want a WordPress searchable database plugin? There are a number of options you'll find on the WordPress.org directory. These include popular plugins like SearchWP, Participants Database, and wpDataTables.
While the above options can do a lot, the ultimate WordPress plugin to create searchable databases is lightyears beyond. In fact, this plugin can do a lot more than create a searchable database in WordPress.
Introducing Formidable Forms. That's right, it's a WordPress forms plugin! Not what you were expecting? Let's think about what a searchable database plugin should do:
- Provide tools for defining fields and uploading and importing data
- Include tools to display data from the database in a variety of ways.
In today's post, we'll show how our plugin can give WordPress websites a serious boost. Formidable doesn't replace the default WordPress database, it extends it. You'll have the power to import data and search it with ease.
Tools for uploading & importing data
When using Formidable Forms, you can upload data to your WordPress site in a few ways:
- Manually input the data
- Using CSV files & XML files
- Submitting forms in the front-end of your site
We often take this for granted over here, but Formidable Forms comes with fully functional data tables in the backend of WordPress. From this UI, you can easily input data into your database manually.
And if you saw the image above, you may have noticed a button for importing entries too. Using this feature you can import CSV and XML files, as well as export them. Just make sure your form has the custom fields you need and you'll be set!
And if you want users to upload data to your site, but don't want them poking around the back-end, that's possible too! Create a form with front-end editing enabled, and users will be able to upload whatever data you want them to.
There are tons of possibilities here. Users can upload images directly to your WordPress document library. They can upload blog posts or whatever post types you use on your site. Or they can simply upload long lists of data.
Tools for searching, filtering & displaying data
- Back-end user interface
- Lookup fields, chained selects, dynamic fields
- Advanced views to display data
With your data uploaded, now you need a way to access it. The built-in Formidable UI has you covered! There are a ton of options ready to go:
Then you are able to take things further with a powerful search tool:
And of course, you can sort your database easily too:
You'll even be able to edit entire entries easily from the back-end:
These are all standard features built-into the core Formidable plugin (even our free version). But there are even more form-building features that can take your database even further.
Advanced tools allow you to build dynamic field relationships inside a database. Using Lookup Fields allows you to create chained selects (also referred to as cascading fields or dependent drop-down lists):
Here's an example of a dynamic data relationship in action:
Finally, there's the powerful Views feature. Views alone allow users to create custom databases with data displayed exactly how you want it.
For example, add a file upload field to a front-end form, collect audio files, and automatically add them to an audio library. Views give you the tools to define the layout and define how the data will be displayed within that layout.
When you use Views, you can create almost anything imaginable online. Create a small personal database or a powerful web application to rival industry-leading CRM platforms!
This is only the beginning...
Formidable Forms is much more than a database plugin... and it's much more than a forms plugin too! With the above features, it's not hard to see how Formidable can replace a directory plugin, for example.
Our humble plugin includes dozens of integrations and extensions. One of our most popular is our WooCommerce form builder, which allows users to take control of their products in ways they never thought possible.
But instead of taking our word for it, why not get Formidable and see for yourself? With our 14-day money-back guarantee, there's no reason not to.
This is great information, Ryan. But it's written more as a sales pitch than as an instructional how-to. Could you follow up with pointers to details for any additional detailed onsite documentation about how to accomplish this very thing -- creating a searchable, sortable, filterable records set in Views, for a knowledge-base kind of application? And/or create a brief screen walkthrough that shows how to set up a site of this kind?
I'm hoping for something like the equivalent of the drill-down Lookup Fields that FF Forms have, but used for the purpose of having visitors search a database of existing FF records, rather than submitting new entries to it from the front end -- something like what formidableforms.com/knowledgebase can do, in fact. The FF support team told me just yesterday that this isn't doable -- I'm hoping they're wrong or misunderstood my question ;-).
Could the Forms lookup fields maybe be part of the solution, e.g. by hiding the Forms' Submit button via a checkbox, or using it for submitting a search that does not save a record and that displays found data on the same page as the search drill-down? Or could similar sorts of drill-downs also be created with Views, possibly using the methods described on the FF documentation for nested views and/or custom search forms?
Thanks,
Jim
Hi Jim,
Thanks for your questions and feedback. This article is intended to be a high-level overview rather than a step-by-step guide on setting up a searchable database.
I think you are right that a detailed how-to tutorial in our docs would be a great benefit to many. We don't have such an article at this time, so you would need to use our documentation to build this functionality. As always, our support team is standing by and ready to answer any questions you run into during the process.