Autocomplete plugin

Rails
1

Hi

Is it possible to use the autocomplete plugin to search using a
keyword on more than one field of a model? How can I do that?

2

If I understand well the question the answer should be yes. If what
you mean is if it is possible to use one field on a page to find data
in more than one column in the table it should be possible the only
thing you would need is to query the table by the columns you desire
to query on.

3

On May 10, 2011, at 7:23 PM, Mlle wrote:

Hi

Is it possible to use the autocomplete plugin to search using a
keyword on more than one field of a model? How can I do that?

When you use autocompletion, you define a field to watch, and an
endpoint to query against. Whatever query conditions you put in the
method that “answers” that endpoint will be the results that appear in
the autocompleter’s list.

So if you had generated:

new Ajax.Autocompleter(‘person’,’/people/lookup’,{});

Then in Person#lookup you would be looking for

Person.all(:conditions => [‘first_name LIKE ? OR last_name
LIKE ?’],"#{params[:value]}%","#{params[:value]}%"])

Crude example, but you get the idea…

Walter

4

Thanks for your comments. I understand what you’re saying but I guess
my question had more to do with the population of the actual list, not
the database query. If you use the autocomplete plugin, the list that
populates under the input box has to be a certain field of a certain
model. For example, when you call this helper:

model_auto_completer_result(@inventories, :inventory_id )

the inventory_id is displayed for each inventory item matching the
query. I’d like to search on two fields in the inventories table and
display whichever field matched in the autocomplete list.

5

On May 11, 2011, at 11:27 AM, Mlle wrote:

display whichever field matched in the autocomplete list.
Back up to the line where you define @inventories. That’s where you
would make the filter broad enough to include hits on more than one
field.

Walter