bsDatabaseSearchPlugin

Introduction

bsDatabaseSearch is alternative search engine for sfLucenePlugin and stands alone from all other search engines available for Symfony and Doctrine. bsDatabaseSearch is simple database search engine that uses MyISAM MySQL tables for storing search index. It needs as little configuration as possible and is high-performance due to using database fulltext index and optimalized queries without using Doctrine hydratation modes.

Requirements

• symfony 1.4.11 + (with bs patches)
• Doctrine 1.2.4 +
• PHP 5.2.x +
• bsCorePlugin

Main Features

• MyISAM MySQL tables for storing search index
• Configuration of index within schema.yml file per each model
• Dynamic model boost to prefere any record over others
• Static boost per model field to prefere any fields over other
• Searching using fulltext MySQL index in Boolean mode
• History of searching
• Reindex task (whole index, per model, per records)
• Supports i18n
• Keywords highlighting
• Using optimized queries for rebuiling and indexing
• Dynamic unlimited amount of categories per record
• Permissions ready
• Lemmatizer ready

Installation

Just enable bsDatabaseSearchPlugin in your project bsConfig.php file. Publish new migrations, migrate your database with new migrations and rebuild doctrine model.

Swithing from sfLucene (bsSearch)

Disable sfLucenePlugin and bsSearchPlugin in your bsConfig.php and install bsDatabaseSearchPlugin like above.

Configuring your model

First you need to update yout schema.yml file. Let’s pretend we have schema.yml file just like this:

Article:

actAs:

bsEventListenable:

<?php if(bsConfig::isPluginEnabled(‘bsSearchPlugin’)): ?>

sfLuceneDoctrineTemplate:

<?php endif; ?>

Timestampable: bsAdminTaskable: bsSlugRetrievable:

I18n: true slug_group: global

I18n:

fields: [is_highlighted, title, author, text, perex]

Model Article has been using bsSearchPlugin and sfLuceneDoctrineTemplate so far. Let’s add bsDatabaseSearch configuration into existing schema.yml file:

Article:

actAs:

bsEventListenable:

<?php if(bsConfig::isPluginEnabled(‘bsSearchPlugin’)): ?>

sfLuceneDoctrineTemplate:

<?php endif; ?> <?php if(bsConfig::isPluginEnabled(‘bsDatabaseSearchPlugin’)): ?>

bsDatabaseIndexable:

fields:

title:

boost: 3 transform: clear

meta_title: 2 meta_keywords: meta_description: perex: author: text: tag_string:

title: title description: perex route: article_show

<?php endif; ?>

Timestampable: bsAdminTaskable: bsCacheClearable:

modules: [‘bsArticle*’, bsSitemap, bsNavigation, bsPage]

bsSlugRetrievable:

I18n: true slug_group: global

I18n:

fields: [is_highlighted, title, author, text, perex]

bsDatabaseSearchPlugin contains bsDatabaseIndexable behavior that takes some special configuration with it and do all the work around the indexing and displaying results of model. It is best practice to use plugin enabled condition in case there were some project without bsDatabaseSearchPlugin enabled. Let’s have a closer look at the configuration options:

Field option

This option contains definition of all model attributes that we want to index and search in. Each field key is name of existing field in model (it doesn’t matter if it is i18n or not, database search engine will auto detect this) and can contains additional options. In the example above there is attribute ‘title’ that contains all two supported attributes: ‘boost’ and ‘transform’. Boost can contains integer value from 1 to max integer value and it multiplies content of model field so it’s more relevant for searching, default value is 1. Second attribute ‘transform’ contains name of transformation function from bsDatabaseSearchTransformation.class class that will transform content of record field into some more effective representation during indexing, default value is ‘textify’. As you can see on field ‘meta_title’ there is also shortcut for defining boost of any field, just add number behind field name. It’s the same as boost: 2. It is obviouse that you can’t define transform function with this shortcut, but engine will use the default one.

Title option

Name of field or function over configuring model that will be used as title in results list. Default method is ‘__toString()’.

Description option

Name of field or function over configuring model that will be used as description in results list. This option could be empty, default is null.

Route option

Name of route to be used as link to detail of result within list of results. Default value is <tabelized model name>_show.

Implementing special interface

To index any model, the model class has to contains one of interfaces located in bsCorePlugin ‘bsRecordIsPublishedInterface’ or ‘bsDatabaseIndexInterface.class’. If record model implements at least one of these interfaces, it’s possible to index it. To use all the build-in features of bsDatabaseSearch engine it is mandatory to implement ‘bsDatabaseIndexInterface.class’ because this interface contains special methods. For details see documentation inside of bsDatabaseIndexInterface.class.php file.

Reindexing

To reindex whole index, any model or any range of recors there are some tasks prepeared for you:

• bs:index-rebuild –env=”...” appliation - this task will drop all the database index and rebuild it for all models and records
• bs:index-rebuild-model –env=”...” appliation –model=”...” [–offset=”...”] [–limit=”...”] - this task will drop database index for specified model and reindex all records within. If ‘offset’ or ‘limit’ arguments are given it will not drop the index, but just reindex given range of records (limit records from offset)

The reindexing process is done in chunks to optimize memory usage. It means that only some range of records is loaded at one time and another will be loaded after current range will be indexed. The chunk size can be configured within app.yml file and default chunk size is 200.

Searching forms

bsDatabaseSearchPlugin contains frontend module for searching and displaying results. Base search form is represented by bsDatabaseSearch/searchBar component, that can be used wherever one page. The searching is done by list action and list component within the same frontend module. Routes and configurations are autoloaded with plugin enabling.

Displaying results

There is standard set of list and list_item partials for displaying results within bsDatabaseSearch module. This templates could be of course override by project partials. But if you want to create special list_item partial for some particular model, just create new partial list_item_<tabelized model name> and it will be autoused by displaying engine so the results list could be mix of any model partials.

That’s all folks! Have a fun.