Another type of user feedback involves metadata properties of the retrieved index items. ATG Search can return properties and values which can segment the retrieval results. This refinement is controlled by configuration data defined by the administrator. Note that this feature is referred to as refinement configuration in ATG Merchandising; see the ATG Merchandising User Guide for information.
The configuration data specifies which properties to use in refinement, the order in which they should be used, and various settings to control how to construct the refinement. For example, the configuration data might specify that manufacturer, product type, and price should be used, where price should be returned in ranges and the other two in enumerated lists, limited to the top three values.
Query Refinement
As another example, the configuration data can specify that the country property will be used initially until all results are from the same country, then state, then county, and so on. The property refinement is dynamic depending on the result set.
