This section includes the following topics:
Note: A search interface does not define or control the user interface through which shoppers search for product data in the storefront.
Understand the All and TypeAhead search interfaces
The Oracle Commerce Cloud provides two search interfaces, which perform different functions as follows:
The search interface
Alldetermines which index fields are examined for possible matches with the shopper’s search terms, how search terms are matched to index fields, and, together with the relevance ranking strategy, how records are sorted in results lists. Only the index fields that are included inAllare examined for possible matches with shoppers’ search terms.Modify the default version of
Allas needed to enable shoppers to find product information easily and efficiently.The search interface
TypeAheadspecifies the index fields for which typeahead functionality is enabled. Removing an index field fromTypeAheaddisables typeahead functionality for searches on that index field. Note that because wildcarding is required by the typeahead feature, wildcarding is enabled by default for all members of the TypeAhead search interface.
You can specify which index fields are included as members in All and TypeAhead using the Search tab of Oracle Commerce Cloud, or the Search and Navigation REST API endpoints to modify the configuration of the search interface.
Important: Use of search interfaces other than All and Typeahead is not supported.
Understand how searches are narrowed
A search interface narrows the scope of shoppers’ searches to specified index fields in your published product data. A search interface does this by specifying:
The dimensions whose dimension values will be examined as possible matches with the shopper’s search term.
The properties whose values will be examined as possible matches with the shopper’s search term.
Note: The dimensions and properties contained by a search interface are known as its members. Searches ignore dimensions and properties that are not members of a search interface.
The dimensions and properties correspond to catalog fields. When catalog content is published:
Product fields that the merchandiser marked as Facet become dimensions.
Product fields that the merchandiser did not mark as Facet become properties.
Product category fields such as “Shirts”, “Dresses”, “Skirts” become dimension values.
Product records (SKUs) grouped under a product category are tagged to the corresponding dimension value.
When a storefront shopper searches on a particular term, the search results include product data records that:
Have a property whose value matches the shopper’s search term, and/or
Are tagged to dimension values that match the shopper’s search term. The dimension values must be in dimensions that are members of the search interface.
For information about how to select the search interface to use, refer to Using Oracle Commerce Cloud.
Example: the search interface All
Suppose that the search interface All includes:
A property named
product.short_descA dimension named
product.category
If a storefront shopper performs a search on the term “backpacks”, the search results contain:
Records with a
product.short_descproperty whose value matches the search term (“backpacks”); for example, a record whoseproduct.short_descproperty is set to “SLR Camera/Laptop Backpack”.and/or
Records tagged to dimension values in the dimension
product.categorythat match the search term (“backpacks”); for example, a record tagged to the dimension value “camera backpacks and cases” in the dimensionproduct.category.
Note: See the following section for information about how search terms are matched to properties and dimensions.
Understand how search strings are matched to index fields
You can configure how search strings are matched to index fields by specifying:
Whether parts of a search string can be individually matched with different members.
Whether partial query matches are supported.
For detailed information, see Search interface attributes.
Understand how the fields array affects the sorting of search results
The order of records in search results is determined by your relevance ranking strategy. A relevance ranking strategy is composed of different modules, each of which sorts records according to its own criteria.
Some modules take into account the order of the members in the fields array of your search interface. For information about how they do this, see Understand how relevance ranking modules sort results.
The position of the member ecr:crossField in the fields array determines the position in the search results of records that are added to the list because of cross-field matches. The member ecr:crossField is taken into account only when the crossFieldMatch attribute is set to always.
