With Spider 6.4.8, a new quick search functionality in Spider is introduced. The feature is a fully integrated search engine based on the Microsoft SQL Server Fulltext feature. It enables the fast finding of objects (in several types) in the Spider application suite.

The following object types are indexed and can therefore be found with the feature: Article, Asset, Catalog article, Contract, Contractor, Employee, Function unit, License, and Manufacturer.

 The former index-based search (OneSearch) is replaced by the new functionality and will be removed with the update to Spider 6.4.8.

Reachability

The index-based search is reachable in most of the Spider application forms on the top right of each page. Please see the magnifier icon and click on it to open the search box.

Search Result

The search results are displayed grouped by type. The hits within their groups are displayed as hyperlinks that lead to the detail page of the indexed object.

For performance reasons, the display of results per object group is limited to 150,000 hits. If this limit is exceeded, a message is issued (in this example for catalog articles). To get more specific results, the query has to be qualified by additional search terms.

Search Logic

The index-based search allows to show results by using single words as well as with the combination of multiple search terms. Therefore, the feature follows these rules:

Operators

By default, given search terms will be combined following the logic of AND. The index-based search also supports the operators OR and NOT.

 Operators must not appear at the beginning of a search query, as they must combine two search terms. Otherwise, an internal error occurs.

Word breaking

By default, Microsoft SQL Server using characters like dots and hyphens as word breakers. For example, "company-device-333" would be found by searching for "device" as well as "device" and/or "333". Specific fields like hostnames contain those characters in their actual names. To be able to search for specific names, the index functionality replaces those characters internally. Therefore, hostnames can be found by their specific names.

Type filters

By using type filters, the search result can be limited to a specific type. This is done by typing the object type followed by a colon, a space character, and the search term, e.g.:

manufacturer: microsoft

Supported type filters

Requirements & Configuration

To get the new feature up and running, following steps should be considered:

• The SQL Server Fulltext feature is installed and enabled
• There is sufficient disk space available on the system (10 Gigabyte recommended)
• Feature is activated in the Spider configuration (disabled by default)
• Feature is activated in mandator details (enabled by default)
• The index has been created and is up to date

To support the configuration of the index-based search, an administrative page has been added to the Spider user interface. It is available through the Spider main menu via System > Information about index.

Furthermore, the feature will be enabled in the details page of the mandator. Here, the tab page "Index-based search" has been added.