Hoogle Embed

Summary: Hoogle Embed lets you include a small interactive Hoogle search box on your web page.

I have just released Hoogle 4.2, which adds the feature Hoogle Embed, letting you embed a small Hoogle powered search box on any web page. For an example, visit the Hoogle page on my website, and try typing "database" in the search box on the right. You should see:



As you type, the search box will perform Hoogle searches on the Hoogle API, and display the results. Selecting a result will visit the associated documentation. Pressing the Search button will perform the search at the Hoogle website.

• Hoogle Embed has been tested in Chrome, Firefox and IE. Using IE Using IE 7 or below you may not see results unless the page being displayed is on the same server as the Hoogle instance (i.e. haskell.org), due to restrictions on cross domain AJAX requests. This limitation can probably be overcome with additional work, if people are interested.


• Hoogle Embed degrades gracefully if the browser does not support Javascript, leaving just the search box.


• Configuration options allow you to automatically add a prefix or suffix to the users search, for example adding +hoogle to search only the Hoogle API.


• This feature works with either a custom Hoogle instance, or the standard version on haskell.org.

Using Hoogle Embed in your web page

To include Hoogle Embed on a web page, simply add the following piece of HTML:

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://haskell.org/hoogle/datadir/resources/jquery-1.4.2.js"></script>
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://haskell.org/hoogle/datadir/resources/hoogle.js"></script>
<form action="http://haskell.org/hoogle/" method="get">
  <input type="text"   name="hoogle" id="hoogle" accesskey="1" />
  <input type="hidden" name="prefix" value="+base" />
  <input type="submit" value="Search" />
</form>

To use a different Hoogle server change the action field of the form. To specify a prefix/suffix for all searches add an input field with the name prefix/suffix. For example, the above snippet only searches the base pacakge. By eliminating the prefix line it will search using the default Hoogle settings (the Haskell platform).

The Hoogle Embed feature is usable on any web page, but I think would be particularly effective on pages such as the Hackage page for a package, or for any Haddock documentation (perhaps when using a flag such as --hoogle-embed). I encourage anyone who is interested to submit patches to the relevant projects.

Hoogle Manual

I am currently considering the issue of documentation, and would welcome other peoples thoughts. Currently the Hoogle manual is hosted on the Haskell Wiki, but is somewhat out of date. For all other packages, I tend to write an HTML manual stored in the darcs repo, such as for hlint. There are advantages to both formats - the wiki can be easily edited by many people, but the darcs manual can be updated simultaneously with the code and is available offline (most Hoogle work is done on a train without internet access, so this issue is very relevant). My current thought is to remove the wiki page and move it's contents into darcs.

Edit: Fixed the Javascript links.

Edit 2: Hoogle Embed now works cross domain in IE 8 and above.

Hoogle At 1.7 Million Searches

Summary: I detail some of the changes in today's Hoogle release; I outline future plans for Hoogle; I plot some statistics, noting that Hoogle has been used for 1.7 million searches.

New Features

Hoogle is a Haskell API search engine, which I've been working on since 2004. Today I updated the web version at http://haskell.org/hoogle, and uploaded a new version to Hackage. Since my last release I've been working on several new features:

• Instant Search - in the top right corner you will see a link entitled "Instant is off". Click that link to turn instant search on, and then searches will be performed as you type. This feature is still experimental, but I already rely on it for my searches.


• Visual Refresh - I've modified the style and layout, trying to improve the general feel, especially when used in conjunction with instant search. I added links to make the package filtering options more accessible and I collapse identical results available from different modules.


• Database Update - thanks to Ian Lynagh and Ross Paterson I've been able to update all the Hoogle databases, including for the base package. In the future I hope to keep Hoogle continuously updated.

Future Plans

There are three big improvements I plan to make to Hoogle:

• Better Data - Hoogle relies on data from Haddock, uploaded to Hackage, by Cabal. This release improves the data, but there are still further improvements to be made. There are several bugs in Haddock, and data for the base library is not yet available on Hackage. If Hoogle could integrate more closely with Cabal then Hoogle could search users local packages. Many of these problems require coordination between several projects, and any offers of help would be welcome. Some bugs: #80, #11, #339, #60, #183.


• Better Search Syntax - the search syntax in Hoogle is acceptable, but isn't that close to other search engines, doesn't always mesh well with instant search and has a number of bugs. I intend to overhaul the search syntax, hopefully improving the feel of Hoogle. Some bugs: #34, #61, #398, #130.


• Improved Database/Searching - type search needs to execute faster and give better results. By executing faster Hoogle will be able to search the whole of Hackage at once. Hoogle has gone through four entirely different iterations of type search already, and I have a design for the fifth version. Some bugs: #79, #324, #30, #336, #381.

Statistics

Hoogle logs the date and contents of each search, but stores no personally identifiable information. These statistics all relate to the number of searches made, not including blank searches or suggestions offered by the Firefox search plugin. In the time between adding a logging facility, and making it log the date (2009-Apr-24), there were 631930 searches. Since then there have been at least 1012414 searches, not taking into account about a month where logging was disabled. Generally, searches range between 1000 and 2500 a day.