Searching the Index for Model Entities

The heart of searching for your model entity documents is querying for what you indexed. To do this, contribute search terms to the Liferay DXP search query.

The extension points (i.e., the interfaces to implement) on this page are provided by the com.liferay.portal.search.spi bundle.

Here’s the Gradle dependency for Liferay DXP 7.2.0 GA1:

dependencies {
	compileOnly group: "com.liferay", name: "com.liferay.portal.search.spi", version: "3.2.1"
}

Adding your Model Entity’s Terms to the Query

KeywordQueryContributor classes contribute clauses to the ongoing search query, to control the way model entities are searched. If you’re storing localized fields in the index (a good idea, as covered in the example code for your ModelDocumentContributor), query the localized fields at search time.

Extension Point (SPI): com.liferay.portal.search.spi.model.query.contributor.KeywordQueryContributor

@Component(
	immediate = true,
	property = "indexer.class.name=com.liferay.foo.model.FooEntry",
	service = KeywordQueryContributor.class
)
public class FooEntryKeywordQueryContributor
	implements KeywordQueryContributor {

	@Override
	public void contribute(
		String keywords, BooleanQuery booleanQuery,
		KeywordQueryContributorHelper keywordQueryContributorHelper) {

		SearchContext searchContext =
			keywordQueryContributorHelper.getSearchContext();

		queryHelper.addSearchLocalizedTerm(
			booleanQuery, searchContext, Field.CONTENT, false);
		queryHelper.addSearchTerm(
			booleanQuery, searchContext, Field.SUBTITLE, false);
		queryHelper.addSearchLocalizedTerm(
			booleanQuery, searchContext, Field.TITLE, false);
	}

	@Reference
	protected QueryHelper queryHelper;

}

The entity in this example has a title, subtitle, and content field. The subtitle field wasn’t stored as a localized field, so it’s not searched that way, either.

Contributing Query Clauses to Every Search

It’s a less common need, but to contribute query clauses to every search, regardless of what base entity is being searched, implement a KeywordQueryContributor class registered without an indexer.class.name component property. For example, see AlwaysPresentFieldsKeywordQueryContributor.

It includes a String array that includes the fields that are always searched:

private static final String[] _ALWAYS_PRESENT_FIELDS = {
    Field.COMMENTS, Field.CONTENT, Field.DESCRIPTION, Field.PROPERTIES,
    Field.TITLE, Field.URL, Field.USER_NAME
};

Pre-Filtering

*PreFilterContributor classes control how search results are filtered before they’re returned from the search engine. For example, adding the workflow status to the query ensures that an entity in the trash isn’t returned in the search results. They’re constructed each time a query for the model entity is made.

Extension Pointi (SPI): ModelPreFilterContributors

To contribute filter clauses specific to a model entity, use a ModelPreFilterContributor. This one adds a filter for workflow status:

@Component(
	immediate = true,
	property = "indexer.class.name=com.liferay.foo.model.FooEntry",
	service = ModelPreFilterContributor.class
)
public class FooEntryModelPreFilterContributor
	implements ModelPreFilterContributor {

	@Override
	public void contribute(
		BooleanFilter booleanFilter, ModelSearchSettings modelSearchSettings,
		SearchContext searchContext) {

		addWorkflowStatusFilter(
			booleanFilter, modelSearchSettings, searchContext);
	}

	protected void addWorkflowStatusFilter(
		BooleanFilter booleanFilter, ModelSearchSettings modelSearchSettings,
		SearchContext searchContext) {

		workflowStatusModelPreFilterContributor.contribute(
			booleanFilter, modelSearchSettings, searchContext);
	}

	@Reference(target = "(model.pre.filter.contributor.id=WorkflowStatus)")
	protected ModelPreFilterContributor workflowStatusModelPreFilterContributor;

}

Extension Point (SPI): com.liferay.portal.search.spi.model.query.contributor.QueryPreFilterContributor

To contribute Filter clauses to every search, regardless of what base entity is being searched, implement a QueryPreFilterContributor. QueryPreFilterContributor is constructed only once under the root filter during a search. For example, see AssetCategoryTitlesKeywordQueryContributor.

What’s the difference between QueryPreFilterContributor and ModelPreFilterContributor? QueryPreFilterContributor is constructed only once under the root filter during a search, while ModelPreFilterContributor is constructed once per model entity and added under each specific entity’s sub-filter.