title: Limit searches per minute in my mysql database
body: <p>I have a website offering a public database which can be searched by a simple form. I am using PDO for the queries.<br>
  I tried to Google, but I feel like I am missing the right keyword to help myself.</p>
  
  <p>I would like to limit the searches every user can make to 5 searches per minute. What would be the right way of doing this with low effort? I don't need a high security solution, something to slow everything down a bit would help.</p>
  
  <p>Is there a name for this? What can I search for? </p>
  
  <pre><code>// Create a session variable called something like this after you start the session:
  $_SESSION['user_start'] = time();
  
  // Then when they get to submitting the payment, just check whether they're within the 5 minute window
  if (time() - $_SESSION['user_start'] &lt; 300) { // 300 seconds = 5 minutes
      // they're within the 5 minutes so save the details to the database
  } else {
      // sorry, you're out of time
     unset($_SESSION['user_start']); // and unset any other session vars for this task
  }
  </code></pre>