searchkick/elasticsearch set up autocomplete with multiple attributes

Question

I have set up my application with the searchkick gem and am working on the autocomplete feature for my Presenters index. My problem is that I am searching on multiple fields (first_name and last_name), and while I can search for a presenter by both fields - for example, if I have Presenter 'Jennifer Hall', I can type either 'Jennifer' or 'Hall' and the name 'Jennifer Hall' will appear in the autocomplete drop down, but if I type 'Jennifer ' (once I add the space), the name disappears and there are no more suggestions. My question is how can I fix this?

My Code

I have followed this tutorial: Adding search and autocomplete to a Rails app with Elasticsearch

presenter.rb:

class Presenter < ActiveRecord::Base
  searchkick autocomplete: ['first_name', 'last_name'],
             suggest: ['first_name', 'last_name']

  ...
end

presenters_controller.rb:

class PresentersController < ApplicationController
  def index
    if params[:query].present?
      @presenters = Presenter.search(params[:query],
                                     fields: [:first_name, :last_name],
                                     page: params[:page])
    else
      @presenters = Presenter.all.page params[:page]
    end
  end

  def autocomplete
    render json: Presenter.search(params[:query],
                 autocomplete: true,
                 fields: [:first_name, :last_name],
                 limit: 10).map { |presenter|
                   presenter.first_name + " " + presenter.last_name
                 }
  end

  ...
end

I got the .map{ |presenter| etc. } idea from here:

how do i map multiple attributes in rails with searchkick gem

However, when I followed the solution exactly, I only got 'undefined' in my drop-down of suggested names. Changing it to presenter.first_name + " " + presenter.last_name made it so the full name appears in the drop-down.

routes.rb:

  resources :presenters, :only => [:index, :show] do
    collection do 
      get :autocomplete
    end

index.html.haml:

.container
  = form_tag presenters_path, method: :get do 
    - if params[:query].present?
      .btn-search.btn-clearsearch
        = link_to "clear", presenters_path
    - else
      .search
        Search
    = text_field_tag :query, params[:query],
                     id: "presenter_search",
                     autocomplete: "off"
    = submit_tag "go", class: "btn-search"

I am using typeahead.js, so that works with:

application.html.haml:

= javascript_include_tag 'application'
= javascript_include_tag
  "//cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/typeahead.js/0.9.3/typeahead.min.js"

and

presenter.js.coffee:

$ ->
    $('#presenter_search').typeahead
        name: "presenter"
        remote: "/presenters/autocomplete?query=%QUERY"

So, once again, my problem is that if I type the first name, all options matching that first name will appear in drop-down (both first and last name), but as soon as I type the space, the entire list of suggestions goes away. I have no way of searching, say, any first and last name 'Jennifer H'. I can guess that the problem is with the mapping in the controller/autocomplete action, but typing:

.map(&:first_name, &:last_name)

or

.map(&:first_name, :last_name)

generate errors, and

.map{ |presenter| presenter.slice(:first_name, :last_name) }

makes all suggestions in the drop-down read 'undefined.'

Any suggestions on how to solve this?

Answer 1

Hope this helps. Remember to reindex with rake searchkick:reindex CLASS=Model_name

// in model

def full_name
  [first_name, last_name].join(' ') 
end

searchkick text_middle: ['full_name'], autocomplete: ['full_name']

def search_data
  {
    full_name: full_name
  }  
end

// in controller
users = User.search params[:query], fields: [{"full_name" => :text_middle}]