[Zope] Searching ZCatalog - sub-words?

[sean.upton@uniontrib.com]

My company, a major US newspaper, are about to deploy a new online
classified ad system built using Zope.  ZCatalog queries are at the core of
the system's functionality, and I am very happy with the status of our
system's search abilities using a globbing vocabulary.  

My concern is that not all users are "power searchers" -- in fact, most will
be using the default search box on the site's front page and not even know
that they can do wildcard searches.  A search of one day's worth of
classified ads for "engineer" brings up 40 results; a search for "engineer
OR engineers" brings up 49 items; a search for "engineer OR engineers OR
engineering" brings up 79 items; a search for "engineer*" brings up 83.  

I guess what I am wondering is if there is a way to search with sub-words
without explicit use of wildcards?  That is to say, provide a default option
(perhaps something that could be disabled with a simple checkbox in the
quick search form) that automatically searches using sub-words, so that a
search for engineer was actually rewritten as a search for "engineer*"
instead.  I suppose that one could rewrite
REQUEST['nameOfIndexToBeSearched'] prior to <dtml-in Catalog> to achieve
those results, but I am wondering if there might be a simpler solution?

Thoughts?

Sean 

=========================
Sean Upton
Senior Programmer/Analyst
SignOnSanDiego.com
The San Diego Union-Tribune
619.718.5241
sean.upton@uniontrib.com
=========================