Simple Jobs Portal With PHP MYSQL (Free Download)

Welcome to a tutorial on how to create a simple jobs portal with PHP and MYSQL. Have some available job positions? Want to add a jobs section to your website? Let us walk through a simple jobs portal in this guide – Read on!

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

EXAMPLE CODE DOWNLOAD

Source code on GitHub Gist

Just click on “download zip” or do a git clone. I have released it under the MIT license, so feel free to build on top of it or use it in your own project.

 

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PART 1) THE DATABASE

1A) COMPANIES TABLE

-- (A) COMPANIES
CREATE TABLE `companies` (
  `company_id` bigint(20) NOT NULL,
  `company_name` varchar(255) NOT NULL,
  `company_desc` longtext NOT NULL
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8mb4;
 
ALTER TABLE `companies`
  ADD PRIMARY KEY (`company_id`),
  ADD KEY (`company_name`);
 
ALTER TABLE `companies`
  MODIFY `company_id` bigint(20) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, AUTO_INCREMENT=1;

• company_id Primary key, auto-increment.
• company_name Name of the company.
• company_desc A description of the company.

This one should be self-explanatory. Feel free to add more fields as required – Email, webpage, telephone, industry, etc…

 

1B) JOBS TABLE

-- (B) JOBS
CREATE TABLE `jobs` (
  `job_id` bigint(20) NOT NULL,
  `company_id` bigint(20) NOT NULL,
  `job_title` varchar(255) NOT NULL,
  `job_desc` text NOT NULL,
  `job_detail` longtext NOT NULL,
  `job_type` varchar(1) NOT NULL DEFAULT 'F',
  `job_date` DATETIME NOT NULL DEFAULT CURRENT_TIMESTAMP
) ENGINE=InnoDB DEFAULT CHARSET=utf8mb4;

ALTER TABLE `jobs`
  ADD PRIMARY KEY (`job_id`),
  ADD KEY (`job_title`),
  ADD KEY (`company_id`),
  ADD FULLTEXT(`job_desc`),
  ADD FULLTEXT(`job_detail`),
  ADD KEY (`job_type`),
  ADD KEY (`job_date`);

ALTER TABLE `jobs`
  MODIFY `job_id` bigint(20) NOT NULL AUTO_INCREMENT, AUTO_INCREMENT=1;

• job_id Primary key, auto-increment.
• company_id The company offering this job. Foreign key.
• job_title Title of the job.
• job_desc A short description of the job.
• job_detail Full page description of the job.
• job_type Full time, part-time, contract, freelance, temporary, etc…
• job_date Date when the job is posted.

Once again, feel free to add more fields as required.

 

 

PART 2) PHP JOBS LIBRARY

2A) INITIALIZE

<?php
class Jobs {
  // (A) CONSTRUCTOR - CONNECT TO THE DATABASE
  private $pdo = null;
  private $stmt = null;
  public $error;
  function __construct () {
    $this->pdo = new PDO(
      "mysql:host=".DB_HOST.";dbname=".DB_NAME.";charset=".DB_CHARSET,
      DB_USER, DB_PASSWORD, [
      PDO::ATTR_ERRMODE => PDO::ERRMODE_EXCEPTION,
      PDO::ATTR_DEFAULT_FETCH_MODE => PDO::FETCH_ASSOC
    ]);
  }
 
  // (B) DESTRUCTOR - CLOSE DATABASE CONNECTION
  function __destruct () {
    if ($this->stmt !== null) { $this->stmt = null; }
    if ($this->pdo !== null) { $this->pdo = null; }
  }
 
  // (C) EXECUTE SQL QUERY
  function query ($sql, $data=null) : void {
    $this->stmt = $this->pdo->prepare($sql);
    $this->stmt->execute($data);
  }
  // ...
}
 
// (H) DATABASE SETTINGS - CHANGE TO YOUR OWN!
define("DB_HOST", "localhost");
define("DB_NAME", "test");
define("DB_CHARSET", "utf8mb4");
define("DB_USER", "root");
define("DB_PASSWORD", "");
 
// (I) JOB TYPE DEFINITION
define("JOB_TYPE", [
  "F" => "Full Time", "P" => "Part Time", "L" => "Freelance"
]);
 
// (J) JOBS OBJECT
$_JOB = new Jobs();

The library looks massive at first, but keep calm and look closely.

• (A, B, J) When $_JOB = new Jobs() is created, the constructor will connect to the database. The destructor closes the database connection.
• (C) query() is a helper function to run an SQL query.
• (H) Database settings. Remember to change these to your own.
• (I) The job types. Feel free to add more of your own.

 

 

2B) JOBS FUNCTIONS

// (D) SAVE COMPANY
function saveCo ($name, $desc, $id=null) {
  $sql = $id==null
    ? "INSERT INTO `companies` (`company_name`, `company_desc`) VALUES (?,?)"
    : "UPDATE `companies` SET `company_name`=?, `company_desc`=? WHERE `company_id`=?";
  $data = [$name, $desc];
  if ($id!=null) { $data[] = $id; }
  $this->query($sql, $data);
  return true;
}
 
// (E) SAVE JOB
function saveJob ($co, $title, $desc, $detail, $type, $id=null) {
  $sql = $id==null
    ? "INSERT INTO `jobs` (`company_id`, `job_title`, `job_desc`, `job_detail`, `job_type`) VALUES (?,?,?,?,?)"
    : "UPDATE `companies` SET `company_id`=?, `job_title`=?, `job_desc`=?, `job_detail`=?, `job_type`=? WHERE `job_id`=?";
  $data = [$co, $title, $desc, $detail, $type];
  if ($id!=null) { $data[] = $id; }
  $this->query($sql, $data);
  return true;
}
 
// (F) GET JOBS
function getJobs ($search=null, $type=null) {
  // (F1) SQL & DATA
  $sql = "SELECT j.`job_id`, j.`job_title`, j.`job_desc`, j.`job_type`, j.`job_date`, c.`company_name`
          FROM `jobs` j
          LEFT JOIN `companies` c USING (`company_id`)";
  $data = [];
  if ($search != null) {
    $sql .= " WHERE `job_title` LIKE ? OR MATCH(`job_desc`) AGAINST (? IN NATURAL LANGUAGE MODE)";
    $data[] = "%$search%";
    $data[] = $search;
  }
  if ($type != null) {
    $sql .= $search == null
      ? " WHERE `job_type`=?"
      : " AND `job_type`=?" ;
    $data[] = $type;
  }
  $sql .= " ORDER BY `job_id` DESC";
 
  // (F2) FETCH JOBS
  $this->query($sql, $data);
  return $this->stmt->fetchAll();
}

// (G) GET JOB
function getJob ($id) {
  $this->query(
  "SELECT * FROM `jobs`
   LEFT JOIN `companies` USING (`company_id`)
   WHERE `job_id`=?", [$id]);
  return $this->stmt->fetch();
}

There are only 4 “actual job library functions”.

• (D) saveCo() Save a company.
• (E) saveJob() Save a job.
• (F) getJobs() Get/search for jobs.
• (G) saveJob() Get the specified job.

 

 

PART 3) JOB SEARCH PAGE

<?php
// (A) LOAD LIBRARY & GET JOBS
require "2-lib-jobs.php";
$jobs = $_JOB->getJobs(
  isset($_POST["search"]) ? $_POST["search"] : null,
  isset($_POST["type"]) ? $_POST["type"] : null,
); ?>
 
<!-- (B) PAGE HEADER -->
<div id="pgHead"><div>
  <h1>PHP Jobs Portal</h1>
  <div>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit.</div>
</div></div>
 
<!-- (C) SEARCH -->
<div id="pgSearch"><form method="post">
  <input type="text" placeholder="Find a job" name="search" value="<?=isset($_POST["search"])?$_POST["search"]:""?>">
  <select name="type">
    <option value="">Everything</option>
    <?php foreach (JOB_TYPE as $t=>$j) {
      printf("<option %svalue='%s'>%s</option>",
        (isset($_POST["type"]) && $_POST["type"]==$t) ? "selected " : "" , $t, $j
      );
    } ?>
  </select>
  <input type="submit" value="Search">
</form></div>

<!-- (D) LISTING -->
<div id="pgList"><?php
  if (is_array($jobs)) { foreach ($jobs as $j) { ?>
  <a class="jCard" target="_blank" href="4-demo-job.php?j=<?=$j["job_id"]?>">
    <div class="jCoTitle">
      <img src="X-potato.png">
      <div>
        <div class="jCo"><?=$j["company_name"]?></div>
        <div class="jTitle"><?=$j["job_title"]?></div>
      </div>
    </div>
    <div class="jDesc"><?=$j["job_desc"]?></div>
    <div class="jTypeDate">
      <?=JOB_TYPE[$j["job_type"]]?><br>
      Posted: <?=$j["job_date"]?>
     </div>
  </a>
<?php }} ?></div>

This page is easier to understand in this order:

• (B) <div id="pgHead"> Nothing much, just a “nice header” to make things look… nice.
• (C) <div id="pgSearch"> The jobs search bar.
• (A) When the search form is submitted, we will do a search for the jobs. If not, just fetch all jobs.
• (D) <div id="pgList"> List of available jobs.

 

 

PART 4) JOB DETAILS PAGE

<?php
// (A) LOAD LIBRARY & GET JOB
require "2-lib-jobs.php";
$job = $_JOB->getJob($_GET["j"]);
if (!is_array($job)) { exit("Invalid job listing"); } ?>
 
<!-- (B) COMPANY HEADER -->
<div id="pgHead">
  <h1><?=$job["company_name"]?></h1>
  <div><?=$job["company_desc"]?></div>
</div>
 
<!-- (C) JOB DETAILS -->
<div id="pgBody">
  <h2 id="jTitle"><?=$job["job_title"]?></h2>
  <div id="jType"><?=JOB_TYPE[$job["job_type"]]?></div>
  <div id="jDetail"><?=$job["job_detail"]?></div>
  <div id="jDate">Posted: <?=$job["job_date"]?></div>
</div>

Lastly, just a simple page to show the job details.

 

 

IMPROVEMENT IDEAS

Before the trolls start singing crazy tunes, this is only a simple example. There is a lot that can be done.

• Proper pagination, so the jobs don’t “overflow”.
• Maybe add a “job status” flag. Give “sponsored” or “highlighted” jobs search priority, and hide jobs that are “obsolete”.
• Maybe add more search options – Search by company, search by region, or search by salary range (add your own fields).
• A proper admin panel and a text editor to manage entries (see links below).
• If you want to open up for company and user registrations, see the links below.
• If you want to let companies enter their own jobs, or allow users to upload their CV/resume – You will have to deal with possible spam.
• Add a payment processor – Paypal, Stripe, Apple Pay, Google Pay, etc…

The possibilities are endless, and I cannot provide free consultations – It is up to you to complete your own system now.

 

LINKS & REFERENCES

• TinyMCE – WYSIWYG Text Editor
• Simple Admin Panel – Code Boxx
• Simple User Registration With PHP MYSQL – Code Boxx
• Simple User Role Management System With PHP MySQL – Code Boxx