CiviCRM Community Forums (archive)

We are still seeing a recurring problem on both Joomla 1.5.23/CiviCRM 3.4.4 and Joomla 1.6.3/CiviCRM 4.0.4 (i.e. this problem (or a related one) was reported to have been solved, but it was still rearing its ugly head as recently as May - see http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-8079).

Basically, Advanced Search criteria are lost when performing an action on search results based on a custom field.  If, after performing an Advanced Search filtered by a custom field, we then click Select All and perform some action (such as Map Contacts), the action pulls the entire category and not just the selected results (e.g., all contacts in the group, instead of just the contacts that meet the specified search criterion).
 
This error does NOT happen when using Search Builder, but it DOES occur if using Advanced Search to replicate a search that looks like the one from Search Builder.  This error ALSO does NOT happen when using Advanced Search with criteria from only the “Basic Criteria” section.

This is THE problem holding us back from cranking out promotion for our site.

Here are all the reports of the problem (or a variation on it) that we could find:
(i)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-4386
(ii)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-1878
(iii)   http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php/topic,7379.msg32368.html#msg32368
(iv)   http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php/topic,14080.msg60102.html#msg60102
(v)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-3329
(vi)   http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php/topic,3949
(vii)   http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php?topic=668.0
(viii)   http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:IoIhe5wfg4kJ:forum.civicrm.org/index.php%3Faction%3Dprofile%3Bu%3D9420%3Bsa%3DshowPosts+site:forum.civicrm.org+civicrm+%22advanced+search%22+all+export+csv+issue&cd=40&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&source=www.goog
(ix)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-2103
(x)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-4505
(xi)   http://forum.civicrm.org/index.php?topic=19274.0
(xii)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-8386
(xiii)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-7905 (patch done in 3.4.4)
(xiv)   http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&newwindow=1&gl=us&q=+site:forum.civicrm.org+civicrm+%22advanced+search%22+criteria+all+records&biw=1229&bih=753
(xv)   http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-8079 (says it is fixed as of May 2011 as follows: “Adding this additional GET param to the contact name link in CRM/Contact/Form/Selector.tpl fixes things: &key=`$qfKey`”)

Here's some additional information which may help to pinpoint the source of the problem and/or a workaround: "action on custom field search results" works as expected when using (1) Firefox on Windows XP or Windows 7 or Vista, or (2) Chrome on Windows Vista.  It does NOT work as expected when using IE8 or IE9 on any platform we've tried.  So, it's clearly an IE glitch.  (Yes, I know, the obvious workaround is to tell our users to install either Firefox or Chrome... but even that solution is beyond the capabilities of some of our users :-)

Here's the step-by-step means to reproduce the "Lose Advanced Search non-Basic criteria for a search with multiple non-Basic criteria" bug:
 
1.  Log on as an administrator into the joomla.civicrm demo using standard downloaded Internet Explorer 8 or 9.
2. Open the CiviCRM component.
3. Choose "Advanced Search."
4. Run an Advanced Search using multiple criteria, at least one not being from the "Basic Criteria" area, that will generate results.
Example:  (a) Choose "Type: Household" from the drop-down list under "Basic Criteria"; then (b) under "Address Fields," choose state=Texas from the drop-down list, then (c) click "Search."  NOTE that the total number of "Households" is 15 or 16 (depending on how many have been entered).
5. The result is THREE Households in Texas.
Now, try doing an action with all three of those records.
6. Click the "All 3 records" radio button.
7. Select an action from the drop-down actions list.
Example: Select "Mailing Labels" and click "Go."
8. The action will be applied to those records selected by only the "Basic" Criteria -- not the additional criterion.
Example: The next screen -- for selecting the label size -- says, at the top, "Number of selected contacts: 15."  NOTE that this is the number of contacts with JUST the Basic criteria, not the subset with an address field listed.  Proceeding with generating labels will, in fact, generate 15 labels -- not the three that had been selected.
9. NEVERTHELESS, clicking the IE browser's Previous Screen button will indicate only the subset is selected.
Example: Clicking the back arrow results in the prior Search Results window that shows the three subset Texas Households.
 
NOTE: This glitch of losing the additional criterion for an action seems to occur regardless of which non-Basic Criteria is/are selected, and regardless of which "Action" is selected.  Similar bugs surfaced in earlier versions of CiviCRM, as indicated at, e.g., http://issues.civicrm.org/jira/browse/CRM-8079.
 
NOTE: We know this glitch does NOT occur in Firefox under Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 7, or under Chrome on Windows Vista.  It seems to be purely an Internet Explorer problem, and persists under IE 9 as it did in IE 8.  But most of our users use IE, and getting them to change could be very difficult or impossible.

Re: "Most of us dont use windows/IE, we'll need a lot of help from you to help debug this case.  Can you use some IE tools to instrument and see what values are POST'ed and compare those with FF (u can use HttpFox or something similar)"

I'm no fan of IE either, but it still has at least a 40-50% (depending on who you ask) usage share; for as long as this problem has been reported, I'm kinda surprised that it's only now that a potential cause has been identified!

That said, I'm happy to do what I can to help debug this... but I'm by no means a PHP programmer so you'll have to bear with me and any "noobie" questions I may ask (particularly in how to use any instrumenting tools to see what values are POSTed).

Using Firebug on FF, here's what's POSTed after clicking Search and getting the "Number of selected contacts: 3" on the next page (hope this is what you were asking for):

_qf_Advanced_next_action   Go
_qf_default   Advanced:refresh
city   
component_mode   1
contact_source   
contact_type[]   Household
country   1228
crmasmSelect0   - select -
crmasmSelect1   - select -
crmasmSelect2   - select -
display_relationship_type   
email   
email_on_hold[on_hold]   
hidden_basic   1
hidden_location   1
hidden_location   1
job_title   
operator   AND
postal_code   
postal_code_high   
postal_code_low   
preferred_communication_m...   
preferred_communication_m...   
preferred_communication_m...   
preferred_communication_m...   
preferred_communication_m...   
preferred_language   
privacy[do_not_email]   
privacy[do_not_mail]   
privacy[do_not_phone]   
privacy[do_not_sms]   
privacy[do_not_toggle]   
privacy[do_not_trade]   
prox_distance   
prox_distance_unit   miles
qfKey   a1448cb59b402122498e3f5c40c9fc2c_7685
qfKey   a1448cb59b402122498e3f5c40c9fc2c_7685
radio_ts   ts_all
sort_name   
state_province[]   1042
street_address   
task   16
uf_group_id   0
world_region   

Source
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded Content-Length: 1007 qfKey=a1448cb59b402122498e3f5c40c9fc2c_7685&hidden_basic=1&hidden_location=1&_qf_default=Advanced%3Arefresh&sort_name=&email=&uf_group_id=0&component_mode=1&display_relationship_type=&crmasmSelect0=-+select+-&contact_type%5B%5D=Household&crmasmSelect1=-+select+-&crmasmSelect2=-+select+-&operator=AND&preferred_language=&privacy%5Bdo_not_phone%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_email%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_mail%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_sms%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_trade%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_toggle%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B1%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B2%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B3%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B4%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B5%5D=&email_on_hold%5Bon_hold%5D=&contact_source=&job_title=&qfKey=a1448cb59b402122498e3f5c40c9fc2c_7685&hidden_location=1&street_address=&city=&postal_code=&postal_code_low=&postal_code_high=&prox_distance=&prox_distance_unit=miles&world_region=&country=1228&state_province%5B%5D=1042&radio_ts=ts_all&task=16&_qf_Advanced_next_action=Go

And, using HTTP Analyzer on IE, here's what's POSTed after clicking Search and getting the "Number of selected contacts: 15" on the next page even though the same search criteria were used as in the post above:

HTTP/1.1 302 Found
Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2011 21:08:11 GMT
Server: Apache/2.2.8 (Ubuntu) DAV/2 SVN/1.5.1 mod_jk/1.2.25 PHP/5.2.4-2ubuntu5.17 with Suhosin-Patch mod_ssl/2.2.8 OpenSSL/0.9.8g
X-Powered-By: PHP/5.2.4-2ubuntu5.17
P3P: CP="NOI ADM DEV PSAi COM NAV OUR OTRo STP IND DEM"
Location: http://joomla.demo.civicrm.org/administrator/index2.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/contact/search/advanced&_qf_Label_display=true&qfKey=8c4a0e2aeb6ef11ca285f95dd43547c8_5293
Vary: Accept-Encoding
Content-Encoding: gzip
Content-Length: 20
Keep-Alive: timeout=15, max=100
Connection: Keep-Alive
Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8
 
POST /administrator/index2.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/contact/search/advanced HTTP/1.1
Accept: application/x-ms-application, image/jpeg, application/xaml+xml, image/gif, image/pjpeg, application/x-ms-xbap, application/x-shockwave-flash, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, application/msword, */*
Referer: http://joomla.demo.civicrm.org/administrator/index2.php?option=com_civicrm&task=civicrm/contact/search/advanced&_qf_Advanced_display=true&qfKey=8c4a0e2aeb6ef11ca285f95dd43547c8_5293
Accept-Language: en-US
User-Agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.1; WOW64; Trident/4.0; GTB7.1; SLCC2; .NET CLR 2.0.50727; .NET CLR 3.5.30729; .NET CLR 3.0.30729; Media Center PC 6.0; .NET4.0C)
Content-Type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Accept-Encoding: gzip, deflate
Host: joomla.demo.civicrm.org
Content-Length: 981
Connection: Keep-Alive
Cache-Control: no-cache
Cookie: efe9288833442529e7db272483e80fb1=2d1f182e9dedeb6900c2d86e6aa1254e; ef76f51e3975464c1cd924444922da4b=7d9c1a006f74780b0f1a4718aacd82c8
qfKey=8c4a0e2aeb6ef11ca285f95dd43547c8_5293&hidden_basic=1&hidden_location=1&_qf_default=Advanced%3Arefresh&sort_name=&email=&uf_group_id=0&component_mode=1&display_relationship_type=&crmasmSelect0=-+select+-&contact_type%5B%5D=Household&crmasmSelect1=-+select+-&crmasmSelect2=-+select+-&operator=AND&preferred_language=&privacy%5Bdo_not_phone%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_email%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_mail%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_sms%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_trade%5D=&privacy%5Bdo_not_toggle%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B1%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B2%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B3%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B4%5D=&preferred_communication_method%5B5%5D=&email_on_hold%5Bon_hold%5D=&contact_source=&job_title=&qfKey=8c4a0e2aeb6ef11ca285f95dd43547c8_5293&hidden_location=1&street_address=&city=&postal_code=&am p;postal_code_low=&postal_code_high=&prox_distance=&prox_distance_unit=miles&world_region=&country=1228&radio_ts=ts_all&task=16&_qf_Advanced_next_action=Go

Hi,

Quite a sizable size of the community is in a code/book sprint and probably will be quite "silent" until it stops and we are all back to more normal schedule and our offices (mid next week)