Remove extra var

- allows to have dynamic definition of attributes depended on the
  instance
- there was no real need for it to be static. Places that used it static
  have been refactored.

fixes #1318

PR #1340 changed/broke them

issue #1317

Sphinx test integration for Travis (from #1341)

The db fixture in the sphinx configuration for unit test takes place
after starting the sphinxserver on travis, by importing the fixture
in the before scripts we allow sphinxsearch on travis to run create
the indexes properly