Change column filter logic in Datatable

Frappe Framework
1

Do people generally prefer strict search? I see that in Frappe all the searches are implemented to return documents that have the exact order of letters searched. I had multiple users tell me that their biggest pain was that they couldn’t find items. So for searching links, I have done an override to the called method. So now it searches like this:

For example:

  • Searching for “john doe” will match:

  • “John Doe”

  • “Johnny Does”

  • “doe john”

  • “johnny does something”

  • But won’t match:

  • “John” (missing “doe”)

  • “Doe” (missing “john”)

  • “Johnny” (missing “doe”)

I wanted to do the same for datatable column filters. But I noticed that it is all implemented in js node module. Is there a simple way to override this or should I contribute to datatable. And maybe we could add option to enable flexible search.

2

Since the filtering logic in frappe-datatable is encapsulated in the JS module, the customization isn’t as straightforward as overriding a server-side controller or a Python method. However, here are a few practical options:

Option 1: Patch frappe-datatable Locally (Not Recommended)

You can fork the frappe-datatable repo, modify the column filtering logic (likely within data.js or filter.js), and bundle your own version. This works well but needs to be re-merged with every upgrade.

Option 2: Extend via Custom App

Create a custom app with Webpack or Vite for frontend assets, you could:

  • Import frappe-datatable directly.
  • Wrap the filtering function to implement fuzzy match logic (e.g., token-based search like includesAllTokens(['john', 'doe'])).
  • Inject your own version into the datatable instantiation.

Option 3: Contribute to Frappe

This seems to be the most sustainable path. A configurable filter strategy perhaps via a filterMatchStrategy: 'strict' | 'tokens' | 'fuzzy' option would be a great enhancement. You could keep strict as default for backward compatibility.

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3

Good idea on options to choose a strategy.
Just now sent a PR adds serbian translation and option to choose search type by ikslavok · Pull Request #209 · frappe/datatable · GitHub

So, if it gets accepted, there is now option to choose strategy like this.

filterMatchStrategy: 'strict' | 'tokens' | 'fuzzy'

strict means: exact order of search string
tokens means: all words must be included in any order, must be exact words
fuzzy: same as tokens, but can be parts of words

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