Widget Development: How do I get the search query?

Question

I'm trying to create a widget that will appear on the search result page on my Q2A site.

For example if a user searches for "plugins" I want my widget to display the word "plugins"

But currently, in my output_widget function, the $request parameter only returns the string "search" but not the search query (which is what I am looking for)

If someone could help me get the search query in the widget I would really appreciate it. Thanks!

Answer 1

Just access the value from the PHP GET array. The Q2A way to do this is: qa_get('q')

Answer 2

I think I may have solved my own problem. Looking at the functions page I saw the function qa_self_html() using this I get ./?qa=search&q=search+query+here 

From here I will just take the substring and manipulate the string in order to get the search query.

I know this isn't the best way to approach this, so if anyone knows a better way to do this please let me know