import re from django.db.models import Q def normalize_query(query_string, findterms=re.compile(r'"([^"]+)"|(\S+)').findall, normspace=re.compile(r'\s{2,}').sub): ''' Splits the query string in invidual keywords, getting rid of unecessary spaces and grouping quoted words together. Example: >>> normalize_query(' some random words "with quotes " and spaces') ['some', 'random', 'words', 'with quotes', 'and', 'spaces'] ''' return [normspace(' ', (t[0] or t[1]).strip()) for t in findterms(query_string)] def get_query(query_string, search_fields): ''' Returns a query, that is a combination of Q objects. That combination aims to search keywords within a model by testing the given search fields. ''' query = None # Query to search for every search term terms = normalize_query(query_string) for term in terms: or_query = None # Query to search for a given term in each field for field_name in search_fields: q = Q(**{"%s__icontains" % field_name: term}) if or_query is None: or_query = q else: or_query = or_query | q if query is None: query = or_query else: query = query & or_query return query def search(request): query_string = '' found_entries = None if ('q' in request.GET) and request.GET['q'].strip(): query_string = request.GET['q'] entry_query = get_query(query_string, ['title', 'body',]) found_entries = Entry.objects.filter(entry_query).order_by('-pub_date') return render_to_response('search/search_results.html', { 'query_string': query_string, 'found_entries': found_entries }, context_instance=RequestContext(request))