LiquidMetal

A mimetic poly-alloy of the Quicksilver scoring algorithm, essentially LiquidMetal. </Schwarzenegger Voice>

Flex matching short abbreviations against longer strings is a boon in productivity for typists. Applications like Quicksilver, Alfred, LaunchBar, and Launchy have made this method of keyboard entry a popular one. It's time to bring this same functionality to web controls. LiquidMetal makes scoring long strings against abbreviations easy.

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Usage

Include the library:

<script src="liquidmetal.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

Score any string against an abbreviation:

LiquidMetal.score("FooBar",  "foo")   //=> 0.950
LiquidMetal.score("FooBar",  "fb")    //=> 0.917
LiquidMetal.score("Foo Bar", "fb")    //=> 0.929
LiquidMetal.score("Foo Bar", "baz")   //=> 0.0
LiquidMetal.score("Foo Bar", "")      //=> 0.8

All scores fall between a range of 0.0 (no match) to 1.0 (perfect match).

Inspired By

• Quicksilver and its scoreForAbbreviation algorithm by Alcor
• Quicksilver.js by Lachie Cox

Why?

• To satisfy my own requirements for the jquery.flexselect plugin
• The Quicksilver algorithm doesn't give proper weight to abbreviations that match the first character of the scored string.
• The Quicksilver algorithm is extremely slow for certain length string/abbreviation combinations because of its use of recursion. While slightly slower for shorter length string/abbreviation combinations, LiquidMetal outperforms the Quicksilver algorithm by orders of magnitude under other conditions.
• The javascript version of the Quicksilver algorithm (Quicksilver.js) is case sensitive and doesn't give added weight to camel case strings; whereas, LiquidMetal is case insensitive and does give added weight to uppercase letters in camel case strings.

Todo

• More tests
• Consider tweaking the scores for "trailing" characters
• Improve implementation of highest score matching (LiquidMetal currently returns the highest scoring match for an abbreviation, but is inefficient)
• See if it's possible to tune the performance further

Author

Ryan McGeary (@rmm5t)

Other

MIT License

Copyright (c) 2009-2013, Ryan McGeary (ryan -[at]- mcgeary [dot] org)