688576 - Search queries appear to support regex comparisons, even though they actually don't.

Status: NEW

(Thunderbird :: Address Book, defect)

Description

[Mike Conley (:mconley) (:⚙️)]

Among the various boolean condition types for address book searches is the "regex" type:

http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/mailnews/addrbook/public/nsIAbBooleanExpression.idl#65

This type doesn't actually appear to be supported anywhere.  Mork-backed address books just return false on a search with this boolean condition:

http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/mailnews/addrbook/src/nsAbDirectoryQuery.cpp#527

LDAP ignores it:

http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/mailnews/addrbook/src/nsAbBoolExprToLDAPFilter.cpp#272

And, after hopping over some deactivated code, Outlook just skips it:

http://mxr.mozilla.org/comm-central/source/mailnews/addrbook/src/nsAbOutlookDirectory.cpp#674

We should just get rid of this boolean operator.  It's confusing, and has caused at least one developer a headache trying to figure out why their regular expression address book searches aren't working.

Comment 1

[FrancoisGodin]

The soundlike operator ("~=") have almost the same problem. It is implemented in LDAP but nowhere else.