Difference between revisions of "Creating custom search forms with the Advanced Search module"

Revision as of 19:57, 23 February 2010

Theme file of the Advanced Search Module is located here:

• \com_jreviews\jreviews\views\themes\{theme_name}\modules\advanced_search.thtml

You can create different search forms by copying the theme file, and adding a suffix to the file name.

Theme Suffix Examples:

advanced_search_movies.thtml - enter "_movies" as Advanced search template suffix in the module's parameters

advanced_search_hotels.thtml - enter "_hotel" as Advanced search template suffix in the module's parameters

When you add a new file to JReviews folders, you need to clear the File Registry in JReviews administration.

Adding custom fields into Advanced Search Module

This is the code that displays default elements of the module:

<div class="jr_fieldDiv">   
	<?php __t("Category");?>: {category}&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
	Keywords: <input type="text" id="jr_advSearchKeywords<?php echo $module_id;?>" name="data[keywords]" value="" />&nbsp;&nbsp;
	<input type="submit" name="advanced_button" value="<?php __t("Search");?>" class="button" />
</div>

To add your custom fields into the form, use these tags:

• {jr_fieldname}: outputs the field
• {jr_fieldname_label}: outputs the field title

For example:

<div class="jr_fieldDiv">   
	<?php __t("Category");?>: {category}&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;{jr_brand_label}: {jr_brand}
	Keywords: <input type="text" id="jr_advSearchKeywords<?php echo $module_id;?>" name="data[keywords]" value="" />&nbsp;&nbsp;
	<input type="submit" name="advanced_button" value="<?php __t("Search");?>" class="button" />
</div>

{jr_brand_label}: {jr_brand} was added into the default code.

And the Advanced Search Module now looks like this:

Use the same process to add your other custom fields also.

[Single select]<=>[Multiple select] Conversion

If you have a single select custom field and want to display it as multiple select, use this:

• {jr_fieldname|m|10} - the last parameter (10) is the size of the field.

The opposite is also possible, to convert multiple select custom field into single select on advanced search form, use this:

• {jr_fieldname|s}

Behavior of search results with select lists

• Multiple select - Since multiple selects allow multiple values to be stored the search will only return the records matching ALL values selected.

• Single select - When a single select list is converted to a multiple select the search will return records matching any of the selected values.

Limiting results to certain sections or categories

If you decide to remove the {categories} tag that displays category select list, you can still limit the search results to one or more categories.

At the bottom of the theme file, before the </form> tag add a hidden element with a category id, for example:

<input type="hidden" name="data[categories][]" value="29" />
<input type="hidden" name="data[categories][]" value="34" />

The code above will limit search results to categories that have IDs 29 and 34.

If you want to limit result to sections, use the same input element, but pre-pend an "s" before the section number:

<input type="hidden" name="data[categories][]" value="s7" />