Working With the Portal Registry Search

Understanding the Portal Registry Search

PeopleTools provides the search definition, PTPORTALREGISTRY, which enables you to index the content references registered in the portal menu registry. If you deploy this search definition and build the index (just as you would any search definition), end users can search for content references and menu items using the free-text edit boxes and navigate to the underlying pages using the search results, rather than navigating the menu structure manually. This can provide an extremely efficient means of accessing application content.

Note:

The portal registry search category is named Menu.

If you run the search from the menu pagelet or drop-down navigation Search Menu edit box, the search request only goes against the current portal. For example, if the user is currently logged into the EMPLOYEE portal, the search will be specific to content references defined within the EMPLOYEE portal only.

If you run the search from the Global Search Bar, the search request goes against all the portals defined in the local portal registry.

The PTPORTALREGISTRY search definition is based on the delivered PTPORTALREGISTRY query, which verifies the "Valid From" and "Valid To" dates for content references.

Note:

For more accurate search results, it is recommended that you schedule running your index updates based on how often the content references in your system change effective dates and expire dates.

Setting Up the Portal Registry Search

To enable Portal Navigator Search:

Deploy the PTPORTALREGISTRY search definition and category.
Build the index.

There are some additional options that can be added as well:

To add "Auto suggest," add permission using PeopleTools, Security to this web library: WEBLIB_PORTAL.PORTAL_SEARCH_PB.FieldFormula.IScript_SESPortalQry. This enables the system for anticipating the users desired search based on the partial input.
To add the Portal Navigator index to Global Search, use PeopleTools, and then Security, and then Permissions and Roles, and then Permission Lists, and then Search Groups, and add the search category, PTPORTALREGISTRY, to the Search Groups grid.
To enable the Navigator category to display in the Global Search drop-down list, select PeopleTools, and then Search Framework, and then Search Admin Activity Guide, and then View Search Contexts. Click the Edit Context link and add PTPORTALREGISTRY to the context type Homepage.
To combine separate search definitions into a single search group, you use the PeopleSoft delivered Administer Remote Search Group ACM plug-in. You can combine search definitions from the same content provider or across content providers. For example, you can combine PTPORTALREGISTRY indexes from multiple content providers into a single Menu global search group.

When you run the Administer Remote Search Groups plug-in, the plug-in:
- Imports the search group from the source.
- Adds the search group to the search context.
- Merges the groups in the search engine server.
For information on using ACM plug-ins, see Automated Configuration Management: Running the PSRUNACM Script.
The facet folder used for CREFs under Fluid Structure and Content, Fluid Pages is the folder that appears after the Fluid Pages folder. For example, in this folder structure (Fluid Structure and Content, Fluid Pages, FOLDER A, CREF A), the facet folder for CREF A will be FOLDER A.
Every search result displays an icon, which is associated with the CREF. If you want to change the associated icon, consider the following:
- PTNAVSRCH_DEF_ICN is the default icon used by the portal registry search (Navigator). If you want to replace this icon, you need to replace PTNAVSRCH_DEF_ICN with your own icon. The icon is uploaded in Application Designer.
- If a CREF has a Tile image associated with it, it will use that Tile image, but only if the image is in the SVG format. If a Tile image is not associated with a CREF or if the CREF uses a non- SVG image type, then the system uses the default icon (PTNAVSRCH_DEF_ICN) for the search result.
To exclude a CREF from the Navigator search index, ensure that you select the Hide from portal navigation option on the Content Ref Administration page.

Note:

A specific CREF must be marked as hidden from navigation to be excluded from PTPORTALREGISTRY. A CREF that belongs to a portal folder that is marked hidden does not mean that the CREF is hidden.

Maintaining the Portal Registry Search

In order to ensure that the PTPORTALREGISTRY index provides accurate search results of content references registered in the portal menu registry, you must remove deleted content references from the index.

When you build an index for the PTPORTALREGISTRY search definition using the incremental index, the indexing process removes expired content references from the index. Currently, the PeopleSoft system does not track the deleted content references in the portal menu registry that should also be removed from the index. In this scenario, PeopleSoft recommends:

Ensure that content references that you want to delete are expired by setting the “Valid To” date to a past date on the Structure and Content page.
Run the incremental index for the PTPORTALREGISTRY search definition, which will delete the expired content references from the index.
Delete the expired content references from the portal menu registry.