Skip to content

Adam Greenwell

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about Lumenare Search.

Current release: 2.1.05

General Questions

Lumenare Search is a WordPress plugin that replaces the default search with a fast, intelligent search experience. It provides instant live results, weighted relevance ranking, typo tolerance, analytics, Search Intelligence, filterable/sortable results, and optional document indexing.

Is Lumenare Search free?

Yes, Lumenare Search is 100% free with no premium version, upsells, or feature limitations.

Does it work with my theme?

Lumenare Search works with any properly-coded WordPress theme. It automatically replaces default search forms and integrates with the block editor. Custom styling can be added via CSS.

Will it slow down my site?

No. Lumenare Search is performance-optimized:

  • Only loads on pages with search functionality
  • Uses efficient database indexes
  • Caches search results for 5 minutes
  • Batch processes large indexing operations
  • Can schedule automatic new-content reindexing instead of forcing full rebuilds

Does it work with WooCommerce?

Yes. Enable "Products" in the post types setting to search WooCommerce products. Product categories and tags can be weighted via taxonomy settings.

Installation & Setup

  1. Go to Plugins → Add New in WordPress
  2. Search for "Lumenare Search"
  3. Click Install Now, then Activate
  4. Go to Settings → Lumenare Search → Index Management
  5. Click "Reindex All Content"

Do I need to configure anything?

Lumenare Search works out of the box with sensible defaults. For most sites, apply the recommended Setup preset and build the initial index. Advanced configuration is optional.

How long does indexing take?

Depends on content volume:

  • Small sites (< 100 posts): Seconds
  • Medium sites (100-1000 posts): 1-5 minutes
  • Large sites (1000+ posts): 5-30 minutes

Indexing runs in batches to prevent timeouts.

Can I index custom post types?

Yes. Go to Settings → General → Post Types and check any custom post types you want to include. Then reindex.

Search Functionality

What's the difference between ANY and ALL match modes?

ANY (OR): Returns results containing at least one keyword.

  • Search: "WordPress security" → Results with "WordPress" OR "security"
  • More results, broader discovery

ALL (AND): Returns results containing all keywords.

  • Search: "WordPress security" → Results with "WordPress" AND "security"
  • Fewer results, more precise

How does fuzzy matching work?

Fuzzy matching finds results despite typos using Levenshtein distance (edit distance). If a user searches for "computr" (missing an 'e'), the system finds "computer" in the index because it's only 1 character different.

The threshold setting controls how many character differences are allowed (default: 2).

What are stop words?

Stop words are common words excluded from indexing because they appear in almost every post and don't help identify relevant content. Examples: "a", "an", "the", "is", "and".

Removing these reduces index size and improves relevance.

How do synonyms work?

Synonyms expand search queries. If you configure "car, automobile, vehicle" as synonyms:

  • User searches "car"
  • System also searches for "automobile" and "vehicle"
  • Results containing any of these words are returned

Synonyms are applied at query time—no reindexing needed.

What is phrase boosting?

Phrase boosting increases relevance for specific multi-word terms. Without it, searching "Master System" might rank posts about any "system" higher than posts specifically about "Sega Master System."

With phrase boosting, exact phrase matches get significant score bonuses.

Relevance & Rankings

How are search results ranked?

Results are ranked by relevance score, calculated from:

  1. Keyword matches – weighted by location (title > excerpt > content)
  2. Taxonomy matches – bonus for matching categories/tags
  3. Phrase boost – bonus for exact phrase matches
  4. Freshness, trending, audio, CTR, post-type, and promotion boosts – optional ranking layers

Higher scores appear first.

Why are my results not relevant?

Common causes:

  1. Weights need tuning – Adjust title/content weights
  2. Missing stop words – Add common irrelevant words
  3. Missing synonyms – Add equivalent terms
  4. Wrong match mode – Try switching ANY/ALL
  5. Need phrase boosting – Add important multi-word terms

See Tuning Guide for details.

Do I need to reindex after changing settings?

Requires reindex:

  • Weight changes (title, excerpt, content, taxonomy)
  • Stop words
  • Post types
  • Indexed custom fields
  • Document indexing or document MIME type changes

Applied immediately:

  • Match mode
  • Synonyms
  • Search phrases
  • Fuzzy matching settings
  • Trending settings
  • Suggestion provider order
  • Query promotions
  • Audio, freshness, and click boost toggles

What analytics are tracked?

  • Search queries – What users search for
  • Results count – How many results each query returned
  • Zero-result queries – Searches that found nothing
  • Click-through – Which results users click
  • Trending – Queries gaining popularity
  • Result impressions – Which results were shown for each query
  • Search Intelligence actions – Reviewed/reopened states, promotions, synonym drafts, remediation outcomes, and Search ROI

Is user data collected?

Search queries, result impressions, clicks, and Search Intelligence action metadata are stored locally in your WordPress database. Optional user ID is stored for logged-in users. No data is sent to external services.

The trending system:

  1. Tracks all search queries
  2. Calculates trending score based on frequency, growth rate, and recency
  3. Queries meeting minimum search threshold become "trending"
  4. Related content receives relevance boost

Trending scores are calculated daily via WordPress cron.

Yes. Add the Lumenare Search Trends widget or Lumenare Search Trends block to display analytics-backed trending or latest successful searches.

Latest searches default to repeated successful queries so one-off private searches are not promoted publicly. Lower the minimum occurrence setting only when the site's analytics policy allows raw latest-query display.

Can I disable analytics?

Analytics are always collected (they're needed for trending), but you can:

  • Disable trending ranking in settings
  • Clear analytics tables via database
  • Ignore the Analytics and Search Intelligence tabs

Ask Site

What is Ask Site?

Ask Site lets visitors ask your site a question in plain language and get an answer assembled from your own indexed content, with the sources cited. It uses the same index that powers search, so it never answers from content that is not already indexed.

Do I need an AI provider to use Ask Site?

No. The default sources-only mode returns a ranked, cited list of relevant content and needs no AI provider. Generated written answers are a separate opt-in that requires WordPress 7.0 or newer with AI Client support.

Why can't visitors see the Ask Site form?

Ask Site hides itself from visitors until its base readiness requirements pass: the feature enabled, a healthy index with public content, a non-zero rate limit, and a resolvable search profile. Administrators still see the form so they can diagnose it. Check Settings → Lumenare Search → Ask Site for the readiness panel.

I selected AI Client mode but only get sources. Why?

The generated-answer requirements are not met, so Ask Site fell back to sources-only rather than failing. Confirm the site runs WordPress 7.0 or newer, AI answers are enabled, AI Client mode is selected, and AI Client support is active.

Can Ask Site expose private or password-protected content?

No. Ask Site only draws on publicly viewable indexed content. Password-protected posts remain findable by title, matching WordPress core behavior, but their excerpt text is withheld from Ask Site sources.

What happens to questions Ask Site can't answer?

They appear in Search Intelligence as opportunities, where you can create a draft answer, look for existing content that covers the question, mark it reviewed, or dismiss it. Bot-like, numeric, non-English, and imported query noise is classified separately so the list stays actionable.

Technical Questions

What database tables are created?

Lumenare Search creates these tables as needed:

  • wp_lumenare_search_index – Keyword index
  • wp_lumenare_search_analytics – Search query logs
  • wp_lumenare_search_trending – Trending topic scores
  • wp_lumenare_search_clicks – Click-through tracking
  • wp_lumenare_search_result_impressions – Results shown for known searches
  • wp_lumenare_search_import_runs – Resumable third-party imports
  • wp_lumenare_search_suggestion_terms – Imported/popular suggestion seeds
  • wp_lumenare_search_opportunity_actions – Search Intelligence workflow state
  • wp_lumenare_search_query_promotions – Reversible exact-query boosts
  • wp_lumenare_search_event_queue – Durable telemetry queue
  • wp_lumenare_search_security_logs – Security filtering logs
  • wp_lumenare_search_ability_logs – Abilities API audit logs when enabled

Does it use external APIs?

Search, indexing, and ranking all happen locally on your server, and no data is sent to external services.

The one exception is opt-in: if you enable Ask Site and switch it to AI Client mode, the visitor's question and the assembled source bundle are sent through the WordPress AI Client to whichever provider that site has configured. Ask Site's default sources-only mode sends nothing off-site.

Is it compatible with caching plugins?

Yes. Search results are cached in WordPress transients. Compatible with WP Super Cache, W3 Total Cache, LiteSpeed Cache, and similar plugins.

AJAX requests are excluded from page caching automatically.

Does it work with multisite?

Yes. Each site in a multisite network has its own search index and settings.

What PHP version is required?

PHP 7.4 or higher. PHP 8.x is supported, with PHP 8.3 compatibility improvements included in the current release.

What WordPress version is required?

WordPress 6.2 or higher. The current release is tested up to WordPress 7.0.

Troubleshooting

Search isn't working at all

  1. Check plugin is enabled in settings
  2. Verify index exists (check Index Management tab)
  3. Check browser console for JavaScript errors
  4. See Troubleshooting Guide

I get no results for queries that should match

  1. Check post types setting includes your content
  2. Verify content is published (not draft)
  3. Check stop words aren't filtering your terms
  4. Try "Any (OR)" match mode
  5. Reindex content

How do I reset everything?

  1. Deactivate the plugin
  2. Delete plugin data (optional: delete wp_lumenare_search_* tables)
  3. Reactivate the plugin
  4. Rebuild index

Where can I get help?

WordPress.org Support Forums

Feature Requests

Can you add [feature]?

Feature requests are welcome! Post them on the WordPress.org support forums with:

  • Description of the feature
  • Use case (why you need it)
  • How you envision it working

Is there a premium version coming?

No. Lumenare Search is and will remain 100% free.

Back to Documentation Index →