[Magento] Default Search / Mini Search returns 0 results

Was debugging this weird problem with a client's Magento 1.5.1.0 site.

The Mini Search (and the default search - http://example.com/catalogsearch/result/?q=searchTerm) is not returning the correct result.

Surprisingly the advanced search is working fine.

After trying out all sort of methods, finding and editing the .phtml, .xml files. I found out that its one of the core files that causes this issue.

Solution

Open up app/code/core/Mage/CatalogSearch/Block/Result.php

Uncomment line 149 and 150

//        $this->getListBlock()
//           ->setCollection($this->_getProductCollection());

Then change line 172

$this->_productCollection = $this->getListBlock()->getLoadedProductCollection();

to

$this->_productCollection = Mage::getSingleton('catalogsearch/layer')->getProductCollection();

That solves the search problem.

:)