EP Search
EP Search adds site search to PageMotor. Drop in a search form shortcode, and a dedicated results page renders matches across your content. Basic but reliable full-text search.
Published by ElmsPark Studio.
Overview
Section titled “Overview”- Search form shortcode for any page (header, sidebar, dedicated page).
- Results page at a configurable URL (typically
/search/). - Title + body matching on pages and posts.
- Relevance ranking — title matches rank above body matches.
- Filter by content type — pages only, posts only, or all.
- Paginated results.
- Search analytics — optional logging of what people search for.
What EP Search doesn’t do: AI-powered semantic search, fuzzy matching, spelling correction, search across external content (like PDFs). It’s a basic SQL LIKE search. For most sites this is plenty.
Requirements
Section titled “Requirements”- PageMotor 0.8.2b or later
- EP Suite base class
Installation
Section titled “Installation”- Download
ep-search.zipfrom the EP Suite downloads page. - Upload via Plugins → Manage Plugins. Activate.
- Create a page at
/search/and add[ep-search-results]. - Add
[ep-search-form]to your header or wherever you want the search box.
Shortcodes
Section titled “Shortcodes”| Shortcode | Purpose |
|---|---|
[ep-search-form] | Search input with submit button. |
[ep-search-results] | Renders results of the current search query (?q=...). |
Settings
Section titled “Settings”- Results page URL. Where search forms submit to (default
/search/). - Results per page. Pagination size.
- Content types to include. Pages, posts, custom types.
- Excerpt length. How much body text to show under each result.
- Highlight matches. Bold the search terms in results.
- Log searches. Enable search analytics.
Search analytics
Section titled “Search analytics”When logging is on, every search is recorded: query, timestamp, results count. View in the admin dashboard:
- Top searches. What people are looking for most.
- Zero-result searches. Queries that returned nothing. Prime candidates for new content.
- Search volume over time.
Useful for spotting content gaps.
Troubleshooting
Section titled “Troubleshooting”“Search returns no results for terms I know are in my content”
Section titled ““Search returns no results for terms I know are in my content””Check:
- The content is Published, not Draft.
- The content type is in the “include” list in settings.
- The terms actually appear — search is literal, not fuzzy. “CEO” won’t match “Chief Executive Officer”.
“Results page returns 404”
Section titled ““Results page returns 404””The page at the Results page URL (default /search/) needs to exist and contain [ep-search-results]. Create it.
“Highlighting breaks page styling”
Section titled ““Highlighting breaks page styling””Highlighting wraps matches in <mark> tags. If your theme styles <mark> oddly, the highlights look wrong. Override in your theme’s CSS.
“Search is slow on a large site”
Section titled ““Search is slow on a large site””LIKE '%query%' queries don’t use indexes. On sites with thousands of pages, search slows. If this becomes a problem, consider external search (Algolia, Meilisearch) via a custom integration — EP Search is deliberately simple.
Feedback and corrections
Section titled “Feedback and corrections”For a quick question about this plugin, EP Support inside your admin is the fastest option. The chat widget sits on every EP plugin settings page and knows which one you’re on, with starter questions and links preloaded for that exact screen.
For anything bigger — a bug report, a feature request, or a “how do I…” that needs a real reply — open a ticket at help.elmspark.com. A real person, helped by AI, writes the reply. Usually within a few hours. Tickets don’t disappear into the void.