Hi Michael,
Sorry about the delay, I did read your previous reply yesterday. I was working on a major index table optimization, and had to answer ticket as fast as possible to have enough time for testing. I was granted access to someone elses live server to test, so I had to prioritize that first.
Attachment search
This is a tough one. Looking at the code, I am thinking that the best and fastest solution would be to simply disable the taxonomy term filter for attachments. However there is no filter for the arguments within that class (I guess I have to add this as well). For this reason the only possible solution is to manually disable the term filter within the plugin file.
NOTE: This solution will only work with the non-index table version! Before editing anything, make sure to have a back-up, just in case.
For the fix, follow these steps:
1. Open up the wp-content\plugins\ajax-search-pro\includes\classes\search\class-asp-search-attachments.php
2. Scroll to line 102, which should be this:
$term_query = $this->build_term_query( $wpdb->posts.".ID", $wpdb->posts.'.post_type' );
3. Replace that line with:
$term_query = '';
The best possible solution for this is that I add an option to the back-end, just like the one regarding the custom fields. That should resolve this once and for all.
Intermittent Bug With Number of Search Result Columns (Cards)
I have noted this. I am not sure what might be the issue, but I will go through the pagination generator code before the next release, maybe I can find something that does not belong there.
Export/Import
While I designed this one with a lot of fallback, I only recommend using the export/import feature within the same site (and same plugin versions), as a sort-of archivation tool. It should be solid, as there are many consistency checks during the process. The export gets every single option of the search instance directly from the database, then encodes it. The import does the same, but inversed.
Possible point of failures can be for example mismatches in category IDs, missing taxonomy terms, custom fields between the export and import dates – but that is resolved during the search instance save process and on other actions as well, so the data consistency is checked on multiple occasions.
Common words
When using the index table engine, then on the Advanced options panel, there is a common word filter. Basically it will not index any words entered into that textarea:
Please note, that making a change on the index table options panel will reqire generating a new index.
Filter to Use Parent (Linked) Page for Attachment Search Results Not Functioning with Index Table Method
Indeed, I think I know why. Maybe this one?