Development plans for Search and Replace
Asked by David Stephensen:

Are you continuing to develop this plugin to be intelligent enough for lower level users? For example, that it could distinguish between content and code and present content only to the user in a form that looks like content ( = be like search an replace anywhere else)?


Answers:
author: Andrew Drury
body: I too need the Search \& Replace fix that David Stevenson described - he has described it exactly.

Any update, please?

And where do I find the current plug-in?

Thanks

Andrew Drury


author: Lukas Knoch -Rumpelcoders-
body: Hi,

short update:

Search and replace for space admins is out now with version 1.6 of the Search and Replace plugin. We are now working towards the goal of end user search and replace.

Best,

Lukas

comments: author: Anshul Maheshwari
body: Can you please provide the steps or link for how to use it.


author: David Stephensen
body: My submission as emailed:

Hi Lukas  

Here is my scenario  

I have supplied my client with a procedure manual in Confluence. They are a plumbing company. They have reasonably computer literate people but those people can't understand computer coding.  

They change the name of their major product, the TapLock. From now on it is called TapSecure. In their procedure manual the product is mentioned 100 times and they need to change it.  

1.  
When I say that they cannot do this themselves automatically with a global search and replace, as they could in a word processor, they can't believe it, and become hostile about the solution that I sold them. They say that they should not have to pay a technician to do such a simple thing. There should be a way that they can do it. I have to do it free of charge for them to maintain our relationship and I have lost face from the incident.

2.  
A professional technical writer needs to make a similar change. Though they are pleased to know your plugin is there, they are scared to use it and have to be supported by a programmer. Though Confluence is an absolute delight for a technical writer to use, the absence of this feature dismays them and they don't understand how it could be missing. All of the other tools they use have it available, even free wikis like Tiki Wiki.  

The use scenario is just like any other global search and replace, for example the one in Word. It presents each instance of the search text as a user would see it (not embedded in code), and allows Skip, Replace, or Replace All.  

In Confluence it would need to be able to take notice of permissions and also register new versions of the changed page. I guess that is why it hasn't been written yet. There are some complexities.

Is this the kind of thing that you were asking for?

comments: author: Lukas Knoch -Rumpelcoders-
body: Hi,

thanks for the detailed user stories. We are currently looking into it. The main problem is replacing text in storage format without invalidating the syntax. We have a couple of approaches which might work. The [search and replace for space admins](https://answers.atlassian.com/questions/38058080/access-permissions-for-the-plugin?src=browse) is not a big problem, we will implement it as a first step to the final goal of a (at least more) end user friendly search.

We will keep you postet,

Lukas


author: David Stephensen
body: Excellent! It is really good to know that we might get some progress on this front.


author: David Stephensen
body: Hi Lukas

Thanks for your response. The lack of a proper search and replace has been a gaping hole in Confluence for over 10 years. Recently they decided that they weren't going to provide it and the technical communicators would have to hope that someone would develop a plugin. See <https://jira.atlassian.com/browse/CONF-2522>

Your plugin has brought hope and partly resolves the issue, but we still need end user search and replace.

Fortunately, if you always use the topic title as the link text, Confluence will automatically change all link texts when you change the title of a topic. This helps, but it does not fix the main problem.

Imagine what it is like for people like me having to explain to a client that if they want to change a term throughout their documentation then they have to do it manually or log a tech support call for an expert to do it.

I have a comparative features checklist for technical and procedure documentation software. Confluence fails only on the lack of search and replace.

So my technical communicator colleagues and I really hope that you or someone will get this done.

Cheers

David

comments: author: Lukas Knoch -Rumpelcoders-
body: We are looking into it in more detail. Would you mind sending a feature request with maybe a usage scenario at office\[at\]rumpelcoders.at?

Thanks,

Lukas


author: Lukas Knoch -Rumpelcoders-
body: Hi,

thanks for the interrest in our plugin and sorry for the late answer. Currently there are no plans on supporting an end user interface as this tool does not really contain any permission checking. This would probably also not scale very well to big confluence instances. If you are interrested in something like that, tell us what you have in mind and we might find a solution for that.

Best,

Lukas