Add “none” Full-Text Mode (raw to_tsquery) to allow prefix operators (:*)

[opheus2]

Feature Request: Add mode = none to whereFullText() for raw to_tsquery

Hi! 👋

I’d like to propose adding support for a “none” mode to the full-text query grammar so that whereFullText() can optionally use raw to_tsquery instead of plainto_tsquery, phraseto_tsquery, or websearch_to_tsquery.

Why this is needed

PostgreSQL’s prefix search (:*) is not recognized by:

• plainto_tsquery
• phraseto_tsquery
• websearch_to_tsquery

These functions all treat characters like : and * as literal text, not operators.
This means you cannot perform a prefix search like:

to_tsquery('english', 'Ent:*')

when using the current whereFullText() implementation.

Prefix searching is an extremely common use case (autocomplete, partial-name search, etc.), and the only way to get it is through raw to_tsquery.

Proposed Enhancement

In GrammarFullText@whereFullText, allow:

['mode' => 'none']

to select:

$mode = 'to_tsquery';

Example change:

if (($where['options']['mode'] ?? []) === 'none') {
    $mode = 'to_tsquery';
}

Example Usage

$q->whereFullText('full_name', "{$prefix}:*", [
    'mode' => 'none',
]);

Which would compile to:

to_tsvector('english', full_name) @@ to_tsquery('english', 'Ent:*')

This gives developers a clean and safe way to use native tsquery syntax—especially prefix operators—without manually writing raw SQL.

Willing to contribute

I’m happy to open a PR implementing this addition if you think it fits the project direction.

Thanks for maintaining this excellent package!

---

[tpetry]

Go ahead. But I would prefer to name it the raw mode.

Edit: ok, raw is not best either. Started naming it how you want. We can change the name later.

[opheus2]

@tpetry submitted a PR #122. Please let me know if I missed something. I skipped the test because it's already markedAsSkipped.

Thank you