def search_url(url, table, conn):
    """Attempts to find a row in the table in the database conn with the given
    url. Returns its id value if it is present, returns False otherwise."""
    query = 'select * from %s where original="%s"' % (table, url)
    result = conn.execute(query).fetchall()
    if not result: #url not in our database, return False
        return False
    else:
        return result[0][0]