Increase search field maxlength?
Yes but it's not pretty. Drupal really doesn't want you to change field definitions after they've been created.

The correct way would be to create a new field definition and migrate values from the old field into the new one.

The quick and dirty way would be to manually change the field definition in the database directly.

The quick and dirty way that is deployable via code is to do a two-step process:


Export the field (such as with Features) and alter the #maxlength setting in the code.
TEMPORARILY hack core by commenting out the code in hook_field_update_forbid() in field.api.php.
Deploy a tag containing 1 and 2. Run updates.
UNCOMMENT hook_field_update_forbid and deploy that tag so further changes are not allowed and core is put back in its natural state.


This is terrible but I have done it and it works.