Ow, oke...

http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.1/en/fulltext-fine-tuning.html

:-)

I think I am having a similar problem with search in my Elgg community.

When trying to search for users named "Patrick" I get thse results:

pat = finds all patricks

patr = does not find any results

patrick = finds all patricks.

It is unexpected by the user that "patr" would not bring back results. Does this require mySql fine tuning or can I update my search module somehow?

Thanks in advance for the help.

For my particular problem, it was because the min_chars config variable was set to 4 by default in the search module:

$CONFIG->search_info['min_chars'] = 4;

I am unsure what this does, but I know increasing it to 10 solved all the particular search problems we were experiencing on my site. Now, "patr" returns results including the name "patrick" as a user would expect.