At present you can only search by nickname if you put in just the first initial in quickfind, or via the open a constituent search. Quick find would be more useful if when you typed in first name and last name, it would find those both those who really have the first name and those who have it as their nickname, rather than picking only the one with it as the actual firstname.
Alias is a great tool. Put the last name, nickname in as an alias.