Accession CO subview searches with multiple catalogNumbers only returns last number

[g1rly-c0d3r]

Express search now splits on commas instead of spaces

Fixes #8221

Checklist

• Self-review the PR after opening it to make sure the changes look good and
  self-explanatory (or properly documented)
• Add relevant issue to release milestone

Testing instructions

• Go to any table that has a one-to-many relationship with collection objects and has a subform to add them and open the express search.
• enter a comma-separated list of catalog numbers and make sure that those numbers are all returned in the results box
• try adding spaces between the commas, both before and after to make sure those do not break the search box
• try adding non-conventional whitespace, like a tab to ensure that the search box does not break (you'll have to paste the tab in, here it is between the quotes " ")

Summary by CodeRabbit

• Bug Fixes
  • Enhanced search term parsing to split unquoted input by commas (instead of whitespace), improving multi-term search behavior while keeping quoted single-term searches unchanged.

[coderabbitai]

No actionable comments were generated in the recent review. 🎉

ℹ️ Recent review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: Organization UI

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Pro Plus

Run ID: 725cc698-d1d1-41ef-b316-dcd14320f2bb

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 05a6469 and 8649051.

📒 Files selected for processing (1)

• specifyweb/backend/express_search/search_terms.py

🚧 Files skipped from review as they are similar to previous changes (1)

• specifyweb/backend/express_search/search_terms.py

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📝 Walkthrough

Walkthrough

In parse_search_str, the non-quoted branch that splits the input search string into individual terms is changed from whitespace-based splitting (search_str.split()) to comma-based splitting with trimming ([t.strip() for t in search_str.split(',') if t.strip()]). Quoted-term handling remains unchanged.

Changes

Express Search Term Parsing Fix

Layer / File(s)	Summary
Switch term delimiter from whitespace to comma specifyweb/backend/express_search/search_terms.py	parse_search_str now splits on commas and trims empty segments instead of splitting on whitespace in the non-quoted branch, enabling comma-separated inputs (e.g., catalog numbers) to produce multiple distinct search terms.

🚥 Pre-merge checks | ✅ 4 | ❌ 2

❌ Failed checks (2 warnings)

Check name	Status	Explanation	Resolution
Automatic Tests	⚠️ Warning	The PR modifies the parse_search_str function to split on commas instead of spaces, but includes no automatic unit tests for this critical parsing logic change.	Add unit tests for parse_search_str covering: comma-separated terms, whitespace handling, quoted strings, and edge cases.
Testing Instructions	⚠️ Warning	Testing instructions lack specificity: they reference "any table" instead of the specific Accession form CO subview context from issue #8221, and don't detail verification criteria for success.	Specify "Accession form → CO subview search" instead of "any table," and clarify expected results: "verify all entered catalog numbers appear in results."

✅ Passed checks (4 passed)

Check name	Status	Explanation
Description Check	✅ Passed	Check skipped - CodeRabbit’s high-level summary is enabled.
Title check	✅ Passed	The title accurately describes the main bug being fixed: restoring comma-separated catalog number search functionality in the Accession CO subview.
Linked Issues check	✅ Passed	The code change directly addresses issue #8221 by modifying parse_search_str to split on commas instead of whitespace, enabling multiple catalog number searches as required.
Out of Scope Changes check	✅ Passed	The change is narrowly scoped to the parse_search_str function in the express search module, directly addressing the reported bug with no unrelated modifications.

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✨ Finishing Touches

🧪 Generate unit tests (beta)

• Create PR with unit tests
• Commit unit tests in branch issue-8221

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[coderabbitai]

Actionable comments posted: 1

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Verify each finding against current code. Fix only still-valid issues, skip the
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Inline comments:
In `@specifyweb/backend/express_search/search_terms.py`:
- Line 120: The search_str.split(',') call at line 120 preserves whitespace
around comma-separated terms, causing terms like ' cat2' (with leading space) to
be stored instead of 'cat2'. Since make_term only strips asterisks and not
whitespace, these spaces persist and cause create_text_filter to fail matching
against database values. Fix this by stripping whitespace from each term after
splitting and filtering out empty strings that result from consecutive or
trailing commas. Apply this fix to the split operation itself so that the terms
list contains clean, non-empty values before they are processed downstream.

🪄 Autofix (Beta)

Fix all unresolved CodeRabbit comments on this PR:

• Push a commit to this branch (recommended)
• Create a new PR with the fixes

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ℹ️ Review info

⚙️ Run configuration

Configuration used: Organization UI

Review profile: CHILL

Plan: Pro Plus

Run ID: 2465ae6c-efe6-46ac-85bf-c598717f2cfb

📥 Commits

Reviewing files that changed from the base of the PR and between 9f0ef8c and 05a6469.

📒 Files selected for processing (1)

• specifyweb/backend/express_search/search_terms.py

[emenslin]

• enter a comma-separated list of catalog numbers and make sure that those numbers are all returned in the results box
• try adding spaces between the commas, both before and after to make sure those do not break the search box
• try adding non-conventional whitespace, like a tab to ensure that the search box does not break (you'll have to paste the tab in, here it is between the quotes " ")

Looks good, all results appear in the box with a comma-separated list!