Full implementation of multiple-field autocomplete :
Following my comment, my solution to integrate into jquery-autocomplete was to have a custom implementation of the "internal" autocomplete.
1. Query the database
If you're using ActiveRecord, you can use DGM's solution for your named_scope
If you're using Mongoid, you can use this syntax instead:
scope :by_first_name, ->(regex){
where(:first_name => /#{Regexp.escape(regex)}/i)
}
scope :by_last_name, ->(regex){
where(:last_name => /#{Regexp.escape(regex)}/i)
}
scope :by_name, ->(regex){
any_of([by_first_name(regex).selector, by_last_name(regex).selector])
}
EDIT : if you want a stronger autocomplete that can handle accents, matching parts of text, etc; you should try the mongoid text index. Credits to the original answer there
index(first_name: 'text', last_name: 'text')
scope :by_name, ->(str) {
where(:$text => { :$search => str })
}
And don't forget to build the indexes after adding that rake db:mongoid:create_indexes
So you can basically do User.by_name(something)
2. Create an autocomplete action in your controller
Because the one provided by jquery-autocomplete... ain't gonna do what we want.
Note that you'll have to convert the result to JSON so it can be used in the frontend jquery-autocomplete. For this I have chosen to use the gem ActiveModel::Serializer, but feel free to use something else if you prefer, and skip step 3
In your controller :
def autocomplete
@users = User.by_name(params[:term])
render json: @users, root: false, each_serializer: AutocompleteSerializer
end
3. Reformat the response
Your serializer using the gem activemodel:
I provided the link to the 0.9 version, as the master mainpage doesn't contain the full documentation.
class AutocompleteSerializer < ActiveModel::Serializer
attributes :id, :label, :value
def label
object.name
# Bonus : if you want a different name instead, you can define an 'autocomplete_name' method here or in your user model and use this implementation
# object.respond_to?('autocomplete_name') ? object.autocomplete_name : object.name
end
def value
object.name
end
4. Create a route for your autocompletion
In your routes :
get '/users/autocomplete', to: 'users#autocomplete', as: 'autocomplete_user'
5. Have fun in your views
Finally in your views you can use the default syntax of jquery-rails, but remember to change the path !
<%= form_tag '' do
autocomplete_field_tag 'Name', '', autocomplete_user_path, :id_element => "#{your_id}", class: "form-control"
end %>
RQ : I used some 2-level deep nested forms, so it was a bit tricky to get the right id element your_id. In my case I had to do somethig complicated, but most likely it will be simple for you. You can always have a look at the generated DOM to retrieve the field ID
