I have a database with a lot of words to be used in a tag system. I have created the necessary code for an autocomplete box, but I am not sure of how to fetch the matching entries from the database in the most efficient way.
I know of the LIKE command, but it seems to me that it is more of an EQUAL command. I get only the words that looks exactly like the word I enter.
My plan is to read every row, and then use C#'s string.StartsWith() and string.Contains() functions to find words that may fit, but I am thinking that with a large database, it may be inefficient to read every row and then filter them.
Is there a way to read only rows that starts with or contains a given string from SQL Server?