On Tue 23 Sep 2003, Earle Martin openguides@downlode.org wrote:
Here's a log of a conversation Ivor and I had on IRC the other week about searching - meant to post it before, but forgot. Comments?
First of all, here's an update on where we are with the search, as of OpenGuides 0.25 (just released).
The search box now searches for your terms not only in the titles and bodies of the nodes, but also in the locales and categories. I feel this is much more likely to provide the search results that a user expects. We now require CGI::Wiki 0.49 (also just released) in order that the locale and category searches can be made case-insensitive.
00:13 <ivorw> I'm thinking that we keep the existing idea of priming a page cache that is then searched 00:14 * hex nods 00:14 <ivorw> However, the cache can be primed with pages resulting from an SQL query, in addition to those from a keyword inverted index search
You don't need to do an SQL query, as CGI::Wiki's ->list_nodes_by_metadata method will do this for you.
00:28 <ivorw> How about: King's Head&locale=acton&category=real ale 00:29 <ivorw> Or, how about: locale=west end&category=pubs 00:30 <hex> ah, you mean search syntax 00:30 <hex> I quite like Google style 00:30 <hex> King's Head locale:"West End" category:Pubs
I'm not always clear, reading this conversation, on whether the thing being discussed at any one time is the thing that the user types into the search box, or the query string that will appear in the URL, or the API of OpenGuides::SuperSearch, or what.
00:31 <ivorw> Ah, but are spaces allowed in metadata field names?
Metadata type and value can be whatever you wish.
00:39 <ivorw> Given my previous suggestion, I would quite like to be able to do regexp matches 00:40 <ivorw> e.g. king's head&post_code=~W3
Would anyone actually use this, practically speaking? Perhaps a fuzzy match would be more useful. We do in fact already have a method for fuzzy matching on titles; it's just that nobody has written a user interface for it yet.
In general, I really don't want to have to remember yet another syntax for writing search queries. How about we have an "advanced search" page, with little boxes or even dropdowns so it's absolutely clear which field will be searched for the things you type in.
Search for: _______________________
Locale(s): [ -- select -- ]
Category(ies): [ -- select -- ]
Kind of along the lines of the old Grub and Pub searches, which I hope to find time to resurrect this week.
Kake