You have to change this in your template overrides to make the input box bigger, but you also have to change it in a core component.
The core for the form is here:
components –> com_search –> views –> search –> tmpl –>default_form.php
Copy that and put it in your html folder for your theme:
html –> com_search –> search –> default_form.php
Do this for mod_search as well
path will be:
html –> mod_search –>default.php
That takes care of the form, but the real limitation is in the joomla core:
administrator –>components –> com_search –> helpers –> search.php
find these lines: (starts around line 58)
and change limits (20 –>50 and 19 –> 49)
function limitSearchWord(&$searchword)
{
$restriction = false;
// limit searchword to 20 characters
if ( JString::strlen( $searchword ) > 20 ) {
$searchword = JString::substr( $searchword, 0, 19 );
$restriction = true;
}
// searchword must contain a minimum of 3 characters
if ( $searchword && JString::strlen( $searchword ) < 3 ) {
$searchword = '';
$restriction = true;
}
return $restriction;
}
You'll have to re-do this whenever you update to a new version of Joomla!