Hi @mungbean, thank you for taking your time for reporting this.
In our local testing environment, we couldn’t recreate this issue. Filter Button always works and it expands the filters that you can use to Search. We’d like to know more info about your environment, kindly let me know what’s your WordPress version, which theme you’re using, etc. Also, could you check if it happens on a specific combination? What I mean is, that it happens only when you Search using the location field, category field, etc.
By the way, thank you for your suggestion, we’ll be taking this into our account for future improvement.
Regards,
Mahdi.
Thanks, it seems to have resolved itself. I am using the latest WP and theme (BuddyX). What was happening was after I entered a filter query in the top search field of the filters panel, ran the search, on the filtered/results page, clicking the Filter button to expand the panel, the button was unresponsive, and thus impossible to clear/change the query. I had to go back in the browser etc. just to search again.
Please move the search field outside of the filter panel, and have a reset/clear button. The other filters can remain hidden and function like an optional “advanced search/filter”; or even better, provide settings to specify which filters should be outside of the panel.
I’m not sure if it is the plugin or my theme (BuddyX), but the Filters panel is needlessly huge, with each filter text field being almost full page width. With some CSS/field resizing, the panel could be much smaller. Currently it’s so big, that sometimes I have to scroll to see the Reset/Apply Filters button.
Since I still have to click the Apply button, why is it called “instant search”; that implies the directory is queried/filtered dynamically as a filters/queries are added/applied/run.
This brings me to another point, which I’ve started another support thread on (https://ww.wp.xz.cn/support/topic/filters-categories-in-sidebar/) which is moving the search/filters to the side. This would be a more intuitive layout, and if the filters can happen dynamically without needing to hit a button, it’d function like industry standards.
Thanks again!
Hi @mungbean,
Sorry if the term ‘Instant Search’ misled you. It is basically Ajax Search which prevents users to go to another page to see the results, instead, users can see the result on the page they’re already in. We would have named it Ajax Search but we thought it would be too technical for our less technical users. Anyway, I’ll be sure to pass along your thoughts to our product development team, thank you for your valuable feedback.
Regards,
Mahdi.
No worries, I appreciate the new feature, definitely an improvement over redirecting the user. Well done. For “search field” type filters, having a button makes sense, as for the other toggles/options, most I think could be handled immediately, hence I think it’s good to separate out the search field specifically because I feel that is the first and most common thing to be used and expected by users.
Please also look into an A-Z listing type directory filter that functions with AJAX.
The ideal “all listings page” layout, in my opinion, would be having the filters shown in a sidebar (left/right), the search field at the top of the directory body-section, with an A-Z listing filter beneath the field. All would function with AJAX/dynamically, and even better, at least for the sidebar and A-Z filters that they work immediately (no extra apply button).
And Yes, the sidebar, search, and A-Z are effectively all filters, but I think this layout is both intuitive and attractive. I think you can retain the expandable filter panel (as you have now, some people might prefer it still), but to provide the options in settings for the others and different layouts, would be great and cater to many different use cases.
