nelsonic/ac

AutoComplete
============
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Autocomplete all the words!

## Background

The project we are currently working on requires auto-complete
with a large number of possible words.

This is an experiment to create a great auto-complete experience
on a *shoe-string*.

## Demo: http://wordsy.herokuapp.com/


## Tasks

- [ ] Scrap all this code and re-write from scratch TDD?

### Server

- [x] Read file with list of english words
- [x] Store this list of words as an array called words
- [x] Provide a way to search for a word (*or part of word*) in the words list (to get suggestions)
- [x] store a count of the words that have been searched for

### Client

- [x] Implement simple example UI allowing people to search for words
- [x] Only start searching for suggestions after the person types second character
- [x] send the string of characters the person types to the server
- [ ] When a person clicks on a word in the UI we need to count
that as a "vote" for the word, so we can get some stats.
- [ ] When a word is clicked (or enter key hit) display the definition
- [x] Put demo app on Heroku: http://wordsy.herokuapp.com/
- [x] Remove surplus words files (to reduce bandwidth)
note: extended list is: https://github.com/nelsonic/english-words

Example: search for the **first four characters** of the word awesome:

Returns the following four words:
```
awesome
awesomely
awesomeness
awest
```


#### Got Coverage ?
```
npm run-script cover
```

## Ideas (remind me to do these later)

- [ ] Use the zipped version of the words.txt file to reduce
bandwidth when installing the the module.

- [ ] delete un-compressed version of words.txt
- [ ] Use Socket.io for faster transport of characters and suggestions.


## Research

### Existing Autocompletion Libraries

There are several solutions to the autocomplete/autosuggest problem.
The two most popular are:

- JQuery AutoComplete: http://jqueryui.com/autocomplete/
- Typeahead.js (by Twitter): https://twitter.github.io/typeahead.js/

JQuery AutoComplete is Clunky and requires JQuery UI (#**bloatware**)
try the demo on a mobile device:
  http://jqueryui.com/autocomplete/#remote to see what I mean.

Typeahead is quite slick.
See: https://twitter.github.io/typeahead.js/examples
but is *focussed* on the *front-end*. I needed the back-end component.
(i.e. a *fast* way of returning word suggestions from a large
  dictionary of words - not just a small list of US States or Cities)

### ~~Which Database~~ Why LevelDB?

- *Zero installation* or configuration required. **#winning**
- Benchmarks: http://leveldb.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/doc/benchmark.html
- LevelDB with Node: http://dailyjs.com/2013/05/03/leveldb-and-node-2/
- Try/learn it: http://nodeschool.io/#levelmeup
- Great documentaion at: https://github.com/rvagg/node-levelup
- Another intro: https://medium.com/node-js-javascript/the-ultimate-database-of-the-future-45e0d00f153c


### Media Wiki API

- [ ] http://www.mediawiki.org/wiki/API:Main_page