Use the term details output type to see how ATG Search processes search text. For each term you enter in the Search Text input, the term details output displays the following:

See the following figure for an example. The sections that follow describe each column in the term details output table.

Search Terms

The Search terms column shows each term that is processed in the search. Search text can include one or more search terms, for example, the search text black dress contains the search terms black and dress. In some instances, two or more words can be considered as a single term, such as New York.

You can use the list of search terms to determine whether you need to add or edit terms in the search dictionary. ATG Search allows administrators to add compound terms and words specific to your company—such as product names or proprietary features—and edit thesaurus entries. For more information, see the ATG Search Administration Guide.

Note: Although the search engine breaks search text into individual terms to locate matching items, it also considers other factors when retrieving results and calculating their relevance, such as the frequency and proximity of terms within a content item. For more information, see the ATG Search Query Guide.

Spelling Suggestions or Corrections

The Spelling Suggestions column lists any alternative spellings that the search engine suggests to a user. If spelling corrections are enabled on your site, this column is named Spelling Autocorrections and shows any spell-corrected terms that are included in the search.

You can use this information to test whether the search engine will return an item if a site user searches for it using a common misspelling, for example, the user searches for cashmir instead of cashmere.

Search Term Operators

The Operators column lists any operators that were applied to the search, such as quotation marks, which force a literal interpretation of a term or phrase, for example, "green tea". If your site supports search term operators, you can use this information to test advanced searches on your site.

Other possible operators include:

For more information about operators, see the ATG Search Query Guide.

Words Searched

The Search for forms of column lists the exact terms, synonyms, normalized terms, morphological variations, or spelling corrections that are included in the search. Morphological variations can be word stems, such as shoe when the search term is shoes, or word expansions, such as jump if the search term is hop.

The information in this column can help you understand why certain items appear in the results list even though the items do not contain the exact term you entered in the Search Text input. This can also help you identify what items will be returned when a site user searches for a variation of a product name, feature, or other text parameter.

To modify the words that are searched for a given term, talk to your administrator. For more information, see the ATG Search Administration Guide.

Language Dictionary

The Dictionary column shows the language dictionary and any language adapters that the system uses to analyze the term. For example, “English: healthcare” indicates that an English language dictionary was used with an adapter appropriate for healthcare. When synonyms for a term are found using the default dictionary without an adapter, “language: default” appears in the Dictionary column.

If your search index includes multiple languages, the Dictionary column tells you which language dictionary the search engine used to process the search text.

If you want to add or edit terms, consider creating a custom dictionary in ATG Search. If the search engine searches for synonyms or other morphological variations that you think are inappropriate for your industry, contact your administrator to discuss applying or removing a language adapter. For more information, see the ATG Search Administration Guide.