How to add a drop-down menu driven search that is field-specific per drop-down?

Question

I have an existing drop-down menu search in place at http://www.ncwildflower.org/index.php/plant_galleries/Quick_Plant_Mini-Search/

Or you can also see this on the main page centered at http://www.ncwildflower.org/index.php/ncnps

This site is still in version 1.6.8 because I had to change some code in the search regx file. It simply added two square brackets for the keyword entry, and concatenated the contents of any drop-downs that had content selected.

That was then - this is now!

I have no idea how to accomplish this feat in the Codeigniter-driven present-day EE 2.x.x!

Also, the existing solution was/is crude. If you select “red” as a bloom color drop-down, it simply adds “red” to the overall search terms, but is not specific to the bloom-color field, so it makes mistakes!

I’d like to have such a thing, but be able to make searches for bloom color only look in the bloom-color fields, and keywords for plant-type only refer to the plant-type fields. I’m sure you get my drift.

Anyone have any suggestions how I might at least start tackling this one? It is the only thing holding us back from updating to EE 2.x.x, as this feature is a favorite one by our readership.

Thanks for thinking about it with me!

Terry

Answer 1

There are two search Modules that offer lots of flexibility. You'll need to dig through docs to make sure they match exactly what you need to do...

Low Search
http://gotolow.com/addons/low-search

Solspace Super Search
http://www.solspace.com/software/detail/super_search/