Fixed #2559 -- Added cool new operators for Admin.search_fields, plus documentation. Thanks, Andy Dustman.

git-svn-id: http://code.djangoproject.com/svn/django/trunk@3601 bcc190cf-cafb-0310-a4f2-bffc1f526a37

AUTHORS

@@ -68,6 +68,7 @@ answer newbie questions, and generally made Django that much better:
     deric@monowerks.com
     dne@mayonnaise.net
     Jeremy Dunck <http://dunck.us/>
+    Andy Dustman <farcepest@gmail.com>
     Clint Ecker
     gandalf@owca.info
     Baishampayan Ghose

django/contrib/admin/views/main.py

@@ -711,9 +711,19 @@ class ChangeList(object):
         qs = qs.order_by((self.order_type == 'desc' and '-' or '') + lookup_order_field)
 
         # Apply keyword searches.
+        def construct_search(field_name):
+            if field_name.startswith('^'):
+                return "%s__istartswith" % field_name[1:]
+            elif field_name.startswith('='):
+                return "%s__iexact" % field_name[1:]
+            elif field_name.startswith('@'):
+                return "%s__search" % field_name[1:]
+            else:
+                return "%s__icontains" % field_name
+            
         if self.lookup_opts.admin.search_fields and self.query:
             for bit in self.query.split():
-                or_queries = [models.Q(**{'%s__icontains' % field_name: bit}) for field_name in self.lookup_opts.admin.search_fields]
+                or_queries = [models.Q(**{construct_search(field_name): bit}) for field_name in self.lookup_opts.admin.search_fields]
                 other_qs = QuerySet(self.model)
                 other_qs = other_qs.filter(reduce(operator.or_, or_queries))
                 qs = qs & other_qs

docs/model-api.txt

@@ -1386,6 +1386,41 @@ user searches for ``john lennon``, Django will do the equivalent of this SQL
     WHERE (first_name ILIKE '%john%' OR last_name ILIKE '%john%')
     AND (first_name ILIKE '%lennon%' OR last_name ILIKE '%lennon%')
 
+**New in Django development version:** For faster and/or more restrictive
+searches, prefix the field name with an operator:
+
+``^``
+    Matches the beginning of the field. For example, if ``search_fields`` is
+    set to ``['^first_name', '^last_name']`` and a user searches for
+    ``john lennon``, Django will do the equivalent of this SQL ``WHERE``
+    clause::
+
+        WHERE (first_name ILIKE 'john%' OR last_name ILIKE 'john%')
+        AND (first_name ILIKE 'lennon%' OR last_name ILIKE 'lennon%')
+
+    This query is more efficient than the normal ``'%john%'`` query, because
+    the database only needs to check the beginning of a column's data, rather
+    than seeking through the entire column's data. Plus, if the column has an
+    index on it, some databases may be able to use the index for this query,
+    even though it's a ``LIKE`` query.
+
+``=``
+    Matches exactly, case-insensitive. For example, if
+    ``search_fields`` is set to ``['=first_name', '=last_name']`` and
+    a user searches for ``john lennon``, Django will do the equivalent
+    of this SQL ``WHERE`` clause::
+
+        WHERE (first_name ILIKE 'john' OR last_name ILIKE 'john')
+        AND (first_name ILIKE 'lennon' OR last_name ILIKE 'lennon')
+
+    Note that the query input is split by spaces, so, following this example,
+    it's not currently not possible to search for all records in which
+    ``first_name`` is exactly ``'john winston'`` (containing a space).
+
+``@``
+    Performs a full-text match. This is like the default search method but uses
+    an index. Currently this is only available for MySQL.
+
 Managers
 ========