same as cairo, so i'm marking this as an enhancement

WN

Probably good to introduce a new parameter toplimit (or the like) to limit the total number of hits. This is for compatibility.

-- PTh

This would be a real treat. Have had a suggestions from users to use some top space (WebTopBar) for a "last 5 changed topics, globally"-style info area, but this is not easy to implement using current search.

-- SP

ThisIsEasy CC

---

I hope you are right, CC

Looking at the code, naively I'd probably jump in around line 949 in Search.pm, where all webs has been searched. - Unfortunately, everything is rendered more or less up at this point, so I guess the only simple opportunity left (without a major refactor) is simply regexp'ing the $searchresult for $separator, taking first $toplimit matches and cutting the rest.

In cases where the search result contains $separators on it's own, this will of course not work reliably, but I'm having problems imagining any real life searches where this would actually be a problem.

Other solutions, or will this work? I.e. something like:

Index: lib/TWiki/Search.pm
===================================================================
--- lib/TWiki/Search.pm   (revision 8988)
+++ lib/TWiki/Search.pm   (working copy)
@@ -381,6 +381,7 @@
     my $header =        $params{header} || '';
     my $inline =        $params{inline};
     my $limit =         $params{limit} || '';
+    my $toplimit =      $params{toplimit};
     my $doMultiple =    TWiki::isTrue( $params{multiple} );
     my $nonoise =       TWiki::isTrue( $params{nonoise} );
     my $noEmpty =       TWiki::isTrue( $params{noempty}, $nonoise );
@@ -947,6 +948,12 @@
         return '' if ( $ntopics == 0 && $zeroResults );
     }
 
+    # if toplimit is set, cut down number of searchresults
+    if ( defined $toplimit && $toplimit =~ /(^\d+$)/o && $noTotal ) {
+        my $sep = $separator || "\n";
+        $searchResult =~ s/^((.*?$sep){0,$toplimit}).*$/$1/s;
+    }
+    
     if( $format  && ! $finalTerm ) {
         if( $separator ) {
             $searchResult =~ s/$separator$//s;  # remove separator at end
Index: data/TWiki/VarSEARCH.txt
===================================================================
--- data/TWiki/VarSEARCH.txt   (revision 8988)
+++ data/TWiki/VarSEARCH.txt   (working copy)
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-%META:TOPICINFO{author="TWikiContributor" date="1111929255" format="1.2" version="$Rev$"}%
+%META:TOPICINFO{author="SteffenPoulsen" date="1141253089" format="1.1" version="1.2"}%
 %META:TOPICPARENT{name="TWikiVariables"}%
 #VarSEARCH
 
@@ -15,7 +15,8 @@
      | =type="keyword"= <br /> =type="literal"= <br /> =type="regex"= | Do a keyword search like =soap "web service" -shampoo=; a literal search like =web service=; or RegularExpression search like =soap;web service;!shampoo= | =%<nop>SEARCHVAR- DEFAULTTYPE%= [[TWikiPreferences][preferences]] setting (%SEARCHVARDEFAULTTYPE%) |
      | =scope="topic"= <br /> =scope="text"= <br /> =scope="all"= | Search topic name (title); the text (body) of topic; or all (both) | ="text"= |
      | =order="topic"= <br /> =order="created"= <br />  =order="modified"= <br /> =order="editby"= <br /> =order=<br />&nbsp;"formfield(name)"= | Sort the results of search by the topic names, topic creation time, last modified time, last editor, or named field of TWikiForms. The sorting is done web by web; if you want to sort across webs, create a [[FormattedSearch][formatted]] table and sort it with TablePlugin's initsort. Note that dates are sorted most recent date *last* (i.e at the bottom of the table). | Sort by topic name |
-     | =limit="all"= <br /> =limit="16"= | Limit the number of results returned. This is done after sorting if =order= is specified | All results |
+     | =limit="all"= <br /> =limit="16"= | Limit the number of results returned from a single web. This is done after sorting if =order= is specified | All results |
+     | =toplimit="20"= | Limit the number of total number of results returned. This is done after sorting if =order= is specified. =toplimit= will only work if =nototal= is set to "on". | All results |
      | =date="..."= | limits the results to those pages with latest edit time in the given TimeInterval.  | All results |
      | =reverse="on"= | Reverse the direction of the search | Ascending search |
      | =casesensitive="on"= | Case sensitive search | Ignore case |
@@ -37,4 +38,3 @@
    * Example with format: =%<nop>SEARCH{"FAQ" scope="topic" nosearch="on" nototal="on" header="| *Topic: * | *Summary: * |" format="<nop>| $topic | $summary |"%= _(displays results in a table with header - [[FormattedSearch][details]])_
    * %H% Hint: If the TWiki:Plugins.TablePlugin is installed, you may set a =%<nop>TABLE{}%= variable just before the =%<nop>SEARCH{}%= to alter the output of a search.  Example: =%<nop>TABLE{ tablewidth="90%" }%=
    * Related: [[#VarMETASEARCH][METASEARCH]], [[#VarTOPICLIST][TOPICLIST]], [[#VarWEBLIST][WEBLIST]], FormattedSearch

-- SP

Whooops, completely missed the fact that topics are not globally sorted in $searchResult, but only sorted "per web". This means giving up on the easy part for me.

-- SP

This topic was lost from the lists due to not having a codebase field. Rediscovered 3/2/07.

CC

No spec change please. New paramter is ok.

-- PTh

I would find limitall a more intuitive name, alongside limitweb, while limit is maintained for compatibility.

-- TWiki:Main.ArthurClemens - 03 Feb 2007

Sounds like it's just waiting for an implementor. Set status accordingly.

CC

new limitall and limitweb, keeping limit as undocumented feature sounds like a plan.

-- TWiki:Main.PeterThoeny - 05 Feb 2007

One possible workaround for creating the "last 5 modified pages" search is the following hack:

<!-- Hide the macro assignment
   * Set number_of_changed_topics = 5
   * Set changed_topics = %SEARCH{"info.author!='WikiGnome'" type="query" nosearch="on" nototal="on" 
      limit="%number_of_changed_topics%" web="all" excludetopic="WebStatistics" 
      reverse="on" order="modified" format="$isodate-[[$web/$topic]] ($wikiname)" separator=", "
   }%
-->

%CALC{"$LISTMAP($REPLACE($item,1,$FIND([, $item),[),$LISTTRUNCATE(%number_of_changed_topics%, $LISTREVERSE($LISTSORT(%changed_topics%))))"}%
 

The hack creates a SEARCH which gives comma separated list of topics, prefixed with the last modified date of the topic. Search gives at most number_of_changed_topics topics in each web.

After that we use the SpreadSheetPlugin to modify the list. From backward, first sorting, then reversing, then taking the number_of_changed_topics from the head of the list, then applying replace function to each item to remove the date prefix.

-- AivoJurgenson - 10 Feb 2009

This is now implemented in foswiki 1.1 - due to the paging code needing it - see MakeSEARCHResultPartitioningByWebOptional .

basically, as groupby=none to your SEARCH.

BEWARE that this might change in foswiki 2.0 - though I hope not.

-- SvenDowideit - 19 May 2010