#431: WebSearch: fix test case searching by date 1976-04-01 and t dog
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Reporter: simko | Owner: valkyrie
Type: defect | Status: assigned
Priority: major | Milestone: v1.0
Component: WebSearch | Version:
Resolution: | Keywords:
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Comment (by simko):
It is of secondary importance that we use dateutil on the inside and
that it must emit valid day etc. We should be able to treat whatever
input values we accept from the end users so that both our internal
procedures are happy and the overall input/output expectations are
satisfied.
What is of primary importance is that the test case gets the specs
wrong. The test case says that `find date 1976-04-01 and t dog` must
be translated into `year:1976-04 and title:dog` which is not right. I
think the needs are rather such that (a) `find date YYYY-MM-DD` should
be translated into `year:YYYY-MM-DD` for any value of `DD` (except for
`DD==00` when it should ideally be translated into `year:YYYY-MM` as
mentioned by Travis); (b) `find date YYYY-MM` should be translated
into `year:YYYY-MM`; (c) `find date YYYY` should be translated into
`year:YYYY`; etc. The specs are obviously such that `find date xxxx`
should accept whatever input values SPIRES currently accepts, since we
are emulating SPIRES syntax here.
To cover the above-mentioned cases, we don't even need to use dateutil
internally, since the translation is direct. Actually, when dateutil
is not installed, the things behave just fine for this test case,
which is why I created this ticket in the first place... IOW, the use
of dateutil currently jumps up against the specs, which it shouldn't.
As for technical options, I'd say let's keep using dateutil to treat
input values where it makes sense (`yesterday - 4`) and let's not use
it for input values where it does not make sense (`yyyy-mm-dd`, since
directly translatable). Also, special-casing of the form "if
yyyy-mm-00 then bar else baz" is a simple-to-maintain and
yet-acceptable if/then/else special-casing to me, that should not be
worth considering moving to another library in my eyes... Besides
chances are that the other library may need yet another special-casing
to satisfy yet another SPIRES date-searching compatibility feature.
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Ticket URL: <https://invenio-software.org/ticket/431#comment:7>
Invenio <http://invenio-software.org>
