Speeding up Joomla!'s search results

Thursday, 18 January 2007

First of all why would you cache Joomla! search results?
Let me give you a few reasons:
-it speeds up 'hot' searches, especially if you have a high traffic website and you notice users are frequently searching for some keywords over and over
-you may use Phlooid's tag cloud, wich in turn triggers searches on tags. Wouldn't it be nice if those searches would spawn results immediately?
-searching, especially with more than one keyword in "any words" mode (which is the default mode), scans you database heavily, being a resource-demanding process
-you may have lots of articles, or any other items that a search bot is installed for. Caching will speed up result display on frequent searches.

This tip requires digging some Joomla! internals, specifically the search component.Iit's a core hack, so be aware a Joomla update will wipe it away.
You need to alter one single file, /components/com_search/search.php
This tip is tested and applies to Joomla 1.0.11!, please contact us if you have updated info on 1.0.12

Requirements:
-A Joomla website, preferably version 1.0.11
-A writeable /cache folder in your Joomla! root. this can be verified bu checking system information in your Joomla admin menu.
-you don't need global configuration cache option to be enabled. The hack only depends on cache folder writeability

How it's done:
First of all, make a backup copy of you /components/com_search/search.php. You never know!

Open for editing /components/com_search/search.php, and go to line 151
the line should look like:

$results   = $_MAMBOTS->trigger( 'onSearch', array( $searchword, $phrase, $ordering ) );

Empty this line, then select and copy the following text:

           // search result caching hack by teachmejoomla
/***********************************************************************/           
        global $mosConfig_cachepath;
        require_once( $mosConfig_absolute_path . '/includes/Cache/Lite/Function.php' );
        $lifetime=86400;
        $cache = new Cache_Lite( 
array("cacheDir" => $mosConfig_cachepath."/", 
  "lifeTime" =>  $lifetime) );
 
if ($cachedquery = $cache->get("searchcache_" . $searchword_clean . $phrase . $ordering) ) {
                    $results=unserialize($cachedquery);
                    
             //  echo "<h1>Cache hit on $searchword_clean . $phrase . $ordering</h1>" ;   
               
                }
else
 
{       //MOVED
        $results    = $_MAMBOTS->trigger( 'onSearch', array( $searchword, $phrase, $ordering ) );
        //MOVED
        
        $searchcache=serialize($results);
        //echo $searchcache;
        $cache->save($searchcache,"searchcache_" . $searchword_clean . $phrase . $ordering);
}
/***********************************************************************/

, and paste it in your (search.php) editor window at cursor position.
that's it, you're done.

A few notes

The hack stores results for $lifetime seconds, as a serialized PHP variable.
On the first search for a keyword/keyphrase, the results are pulled from the database and stored in Joomla's cache folder. On subsequent searches, the results are shown directly from cache, eliminating the SQL overhead.
If $lifetime seconds passed since the phrase was searched, the cache is cleaned and renewed automatically.

Enjoy!

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