Searching with CDbCriteria - yii

Question

Is there any way to make a CDbCriteria search (as in compare()) in the fields I'm selecting, but using the model's search() method instead of having to manually add the compare() conditions?
Note that I'm aiming at a solution that will let me write some fewer lines, nothing more and nothing less. So, if the solution is something really hacky and/or mesy, I'll just go for the "add-a-few-compares()" method.
My current code:
$criteria = new CDbCriteria;
$criteria->with = array('A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E');
$criteria->compare("A.field1", "test", false, 'OR');
$criteria->compare("A.field2", "test", false, 'OR');
$criteria->compare("B.field1", "test", false, 'OR');
$criteria->compare("B.field2", "test", false, 'OR');
$dataProvider = new CActiveDataProvider('Z', array(
'criteria'=>$criteria,
//pagination...
//more options...
));

Answer 1

Update: It seems that you are actually looking(from comments below this answer) for partial matches, and for that you will have to pass true to your compare calls:
$criteria->compare("A.field1", "test", true, 'OR');
Even that can be passed to addCondition:
$criteria->addCondition('A.field1 LIKE "%test"','OR');
// or with params as below
$criteria->addCondition('A.field2 LIKE :test','OR');
$criteria->params=array(
':test'=>'%test%',
);
As i have already mentioned in the comments, i don't think it'll be possible to use each model's default search() method. There are other alternatives though, for instance you can use addCondition instead:
$criteria = new CDbCriteria;
$criteria->with = array('A', 'B', 'C', 'D', 'E');
$criteria->together = true; // you'll need together so that the other tables are joined in the same query
$criteria->addCondition('A.field1 = "test"','OR');
$criteria->addCondition('A.field2 = "test"','OR');
// and so on
I would suggest going with the above, because compare (doc-link) should actually be used in cases when you want to "intelligently" determine the operator for comparision, for example: if you are taking the test values from user input and the user is allowed to use operators (<,>,<= etc). After determining the operator to be used in the condition, compare calls other functions accordingly, including addCondition. So using addCondition will atleast avoid those unnecessary checks.
Further if all you have to do is check equality only, i.e if your sql's WHERE is supposed to be:
WHERE A.field1 = "test" OR A.field2 = "test"
then you don't even need addCondition, and you can simply use a more complex condition (doc) :
$criteria->condition='A.field1 = "test" OR A.field2 = "test"';
// or even better if you use params
$criteria->condition='A.field1 =:test1 OR A.field2 =:test2 OR B.field1 =:test3 OR B.field2 =:test3';
$criteria->params=array(
':test1'=>'test',
':test2'=>'anothertest',
'test3'=>'tests' // omitting ':' here for params also works
);