How to make a generic variable in a query

Question

I have this query:

search = request.GET['q']
Entries = Entry.objects.filter(Q(field1__icontains=search), Q(field2__icontains=search), Q(field3__icontains=search))

Is there an elegant way to make this cleaner? (I mean make somthing generic like Q(var_field__icontains=search) and the var_field will be retrived from a requested post that is one of these values field1, field2, field3).

@rednaw https://docs.djangoproject.com/en/dev/topics/db/queries/#complex-lookups-with-q-objects — Samuele Mattiuzzo, Jul 03 '13 at 11:33
I think it looks pretty ok as it is now. You may try this method though: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4487054/search-multiple-fields-of-django-model-without-3rd-party-app — matino, Jul 03 '13 at 11:35
@matino If the number of `Q` objects is fixed, don't bother with `reduce`, it would only clutter your code. Simply use `or` or `and` directly to combine the three `Q`s. — Gerard Yin, Jul 03 '13 at 11:45
In Python 3.x reduce was moved from the standard built-in functions to the functools module. — Paulo Scardine, Jul 03 '13 at 12:41

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 03 '13 at 14:08

So, is this working for you?

search = request.GET['q']
fieldnames = ('field1', 'field2', 'field3')

filters = reduce(operator.and_, 
    (Q(**{'{}__icontains'.format(fieldname): search}) 
     for fieldname in fieldnames))

Entries = Entry.objects.filter(filters)

How to make a generic variable in a query

1 Answers1