Alternate word searches

[Tony Goodrow]

Can you point me in the right direction for creating alternative word searches such as, for example, a search for roster would be treated as a search for schedule?

Thanks,
Tony

[Ernest Marcinko]

Hi!

If I understand correctly, You want to replace specific words by alternatives. The only possible way right now is to add a custom filter function to modify the input text silently before it hits the database. A possible function would be:

[php]add_filter(‘asp_search_phrase_after_cleaning’, ‘asp_alternate_words’, 1, 1);
function asp_alternate_words( $s ) {

// An array of the originals you want to replace
$originals = array(
"word1",
"word2",
"wordN"
);

/* Array of the alternatives
* .. must be the same number as the originals
* "word1" is replaced with "alt1"
* "word2" is replaced with "alt2" etc..
* */
$alternatives = array(
"alt1",
"alt2",
"altN"
);

return str_replace($originals, $alternatives, $s);

}[/php]

Put this to your themes functions.php file. As you can see from the code comments you can add as many words and replacements as you need.

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