Record filters allow an Oracle Commerce application to define arbitrary subsets of the total record set and dynamically restrict search and navigation results to these subsets.

For example, the catalog might be filtered to a subset of records appropriate to the specific end user or user role. The records might be restricted to contain only those visible to the current user based on security policies. Or, an application might allow end users to define their own custom record lists (that is, the set of parts related to a specific project) and then restrict search and navigation based on a selected list. Record filters enable these and many other application features that depend on applying Oracle Commerce search and navigation to dynamically defined and selected subsets of the data.

If you specify a record filter, whether for security, custom catalogs, or any other reason, it is applied before any search processing. The result is that the search query is performed as if the data set only contained records allowed by the record filter.

Record filters support Boolean syntax using property values and dimension values as base predicates and standard Boolean operators (AND, OR, and NOT) to compose complex expressions. For example, a filter can consist of a list of part number property values joined in a multi-way OR expression. Or, a filter might consist of a complex nested expression of ANDs, ORs, and NOTs on dimension IDs and property values.

Filter expressions can be saved and loaded from XML files, or passed directly as part of an MDEX Engine query. In either case, when a filter is selected, the set of visible records is restricted to those matching the filter expression. For example, record search queries will not return records outside the selected subset, and refinement dimension values are restricted to lead only to records contained within the subset.

Finally, it is important to keep in mind that record filters are case-sensitive.