Sphinxsearchlogic

Sphinxsearchlogic is for ThinkingSphinx what Searchlogic is for ActiveRecord.. or at least something similar.

Helpful links

Github: github.com/joost/sphinxsearchlogic

Sphinxsearchlogic is largely based on / using:

Searchlogic: github.com/binarylogic/searchlogic/
ThinkingSphinx: freelancing-god.github.com/ts/en/
Sphinx: www.sphinxsearch.com/

If you’re not familiar with ThinkingSphinx check this presentation!

Install

First you need Sphinx and ThinkingSphinx. Simply because they rock. Check the ThinkingSphinx pages for this. Use the gem in your environment.rb like:

config.gem 'thinking-sphinx', :source => 'http://gemcutter.org'

Install as gem from Gemcutter.org (recommended).

sudo gem install sphinxsearchlogic -s http://gemcutter.org

Next use it in your environment.rb like:

config.gem 'sphinxsearchlogic', :source => 'http://gemcutter.org'

Install as plugin from Github.

./script/plugin install git://github.com/joost/sphinxsearchlogic.git

Usage

Use Sphinxsearchlogic as you use the Searchlogic search method:

@search = Movie.sphinxsearchlogic(params[:search])

The search params you can pass:

Search:

:all => 'something'     # search('something') 
:name => 'john'         # search(:conditions => {:name => 'john'})

Filters:

:with_age => 20         # search(:with => {:age => 20})
:with_age => [21, 22]   # search(:with => {:age => [21, 22]})
:with_age => 20..25     # search(:with => {:age => 20..25})

:without_age => 20      # search(:without => {:age => 20})

For MVAs you can also use:

:with_all_tags => [1,2,3] # search(:with_all => {:tags => [1,2,3]})

Thinking Sphinx scopes:

:my_scope => true       # my_scope (actually called with my_scope(true))
:some_scope => 'sweet'  # some_scope(sweet)

Ordering

Ordering is implemented similar to Searchlogic.

:order => 'ascend_by_created_at'   # :order => :attribute, 
:order => 'descend_by_created_at'  # :order => :attribute, :sort_mode => :desc

More advanced ordering? Use scopes! Like for => ‘rating DESC, votes DESC’ or => :expr, :sort_by => ‘@weight * ranking’

:order => 'my_order_scope'

For your views see the order helper below.

Unsimilar to Searchlogic Sphinxsearchlogic does pagination in the search. You can add them as follows since all arguments are merged.

@search = Movie.sphinxsearchlogic(params[:search], :page => params[:page], :per_page => params[:per_page])

If not specified default limits and pagination is used. As pagination is ‘Always on’ with ThinkingSphinx.

Examples

Your controller

An example controller action:

class MovieController < ApplicationController
  def index
    @search = Movie.sphinxsearchlogic(params[:search], :page => params[:page], :per_page => params[:per_page])
    @movies = @sphinxsearch.results
  end
end

Your search forms

An example view search form:

<% sphinxsearchlogic_form_for @search do |form| %>
  <p>
    <%= form.label :all %>
    <%= form.text_field :all %>
  </p>
  <p>
    <%= form.check_box :scary_movies, {}, '1', nil %>
    Only scary movies
  </p>
<% end %>

The first field will send search params which will fulltext search through your data. The second is making use of a ThinkingSphinx scope (freelancing-god.github.com/ts/en/scopes.html) so it only works if you’ve defined it in your model.

Helpers

You can use a similar order helper as Searchlogic offers. You can order by attributes and fields (only if they are specified as sortable in your ThinkingSphinx index).

<%= order(@search, :by => :title, :as => 'Movie Title')

When you create two ThinkingSphinx scopes in your model you can even do special exotic ordering.

sphinx_scope(:ascend_by_rating_and_votes) { 
    {:order => "rating ASC, votes ASC"}
  }

sphinx_scope(:descend_by_rating_and_votes) { 
    {:order => "rating DESC, votes DESC"}
  }

You can also use this in the helper:

<%= order(@search, :by => :rating_and_votes, :as => 'Special ordering')

TODO

Things that might be in next versions. Please contact me via Github if you’ve any suggestions or want to contribute.

Sanitize

Sanitize params so we don’t f*ck with ThinkingSphinx.

Easy facets (freelancing-god.github.com/ts/en/facets.html) support.

Defaults

On the Model you want to search specify the defaults for the search. Eg. on the Movie model:

sphinxsearchlogic_default_order = 'descend_by_weight'
sphinxsearchlogic_protected = :order, :per_page, :age, :name, :match_mode
sphinxsearchlogic_max_per_page = 100
sphinxsearchlogic_match_mode = :any