Re: BUG #18479: websearch_to_tsquery inconsistent behavior for german when using parentheses

Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>

From: Tom Lane <tgl@sss.pgh.pa.us>
To: esemmano@gmail.com
Cc: pgsql-bugs@lists.postgresql.org
Date: 2024-06-13T22:04:20Z
Lists: pgsql-bugs

Attachments

PG Bug reporting form <noreply@postgresql.org> writes:
> Although the docs
> https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/textsearch-controls.html say nothing
> about websearch_to_tsquery supporting parentheses in queries, I noticed some
> inconsistent behaviour when using multiple 'or' keywords with parentheses in
> postgres 15.4

The definition of websearch_to_tsquery says pretty plainly that
"Other punctuation is ignored".  So I'd expect parens to do nothing.
That makes this problematic:

> select websearch_to_tsquery('german', 'foo or baz bar or (ding dong)');
>           websearch_to_tsquery
> -----------------------------------------
>  'foo' | 'baz' & 'bar' | 'ding' & 'dong'

> select websearch_to_tsquery('german', 'foo or (baz bar) or (ding dong)');
>               websearch_to_tsquery
> ------------------------------------------------
>  'foo' | 'baz' & 'bar' & 'or' & 'ding' & 'dong'


I found what seems to be the issue in gettoken_query_websearch: it
ignores ISOPERATOR chars (including parens) in WAITOPERAND state,
but not in WAITOPERATOR state.  That results in switching back to
WAITOPERAND state which will consume the "or" as a regular word.
So a minimal fix could look like the attached.

It's fairly confusing that this code manages to ignore not-ISOPERATOR
punctuation.  It seems like that gets eaten by gettoken_tsvector()
and then later we decide there's not really a word there.

I'm also confused how come the same thing doesn't happen in the
english tsconfig.  Not sure it's worth poking at more, though.

			regards, tom lane

Commits

  1. Fix parsing of ignored operators in websearch_to_tsquery().