Search Documents

Tigris offers a realtime search for documents in a collection. The fields need to be annotated in order to be indexed. Please check data modeling section. This guide section will walk through how to use Tigris search in different scenarios.

Example collection

Let's first have the collection.

catalogs := tigris.GetCollection[Catalog](catalogdb)

Assuming an e-commerce website that has the above collection catalog and has 6 products(documents) in it.

id	name	price	brand	labels	popularity	reviews
1	fiona handbag	99.9	michael kors	purses	8	{"author": "alice", "rating": 7}
2	tote bag	49	coach	handbags	9	{"author": "olivia", "rating": 8.3}
3	sling bag	75	coach	purses	9	{"author": "alice", "rating": 9.2}
4	sneakers shoes	40	adidas	shoes	10	{"author": "olivia", "rating": 9}
5	running shoes	89	nike	shoes	10	{"author": "olivia", "rating": 8.5}
6	running shorts	35	adidas	clothing	7	{"author": "olivia", "rating": 7.5}

Searching for documents

Search consists of executing a query against one or more text fields. Let's perform a simple search query to lookup any items matching "running".

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().WithQuery("running").Build()
it, err := catalogs.Search(ctx, request)
if err != nil {
    // handle error
}
defer it.Close()

var result search.Result[Catalog]
for it.Next(&result) {
    fmt.Printf("%+v\n", result)
}
if it.Err() != nil {
    // handle streaming error
}

info

Search is case insensitive i.e. a search for term "ruNninG" would match all of ["Running", "running", "RUnnIng", "RUNNING"] etc.

Phrase search

By default, search is performed over individual terms in the text. For example, search for a query string adventure park in a dataset would yield following results:

"California's kids adventure park and Safari"
"Adventure island and water park"
"Long Island water park and adventure activities"
"Six flags kids recreation and adventure park"
"Hollywood adventure park and studios"
"Seaworld adventure and theme park"

The search phrase can be escaped in query for exact match. In the above example, querying for exact phrase \"adventure park\" would return:

"California's kids adventure park and Safari"
"Six flags kids recreation and adventure park"
"The Great America adventure park and Zoo"

Phrases can still be combined with keywords for richer text search. Continuing above example, the query string kids \"adventure park\" would result in:

"California's kids adventure park and Safari"
"Six flags kids recreation and adventure park"

phraseSearch := search.NewRequestBuilder().WithQuery("\"adventure park\"").Build()

mixedSearch := search.NewRequestBuilder().WithQuery("kids \"adventure park\"").Build()

Match all search query

When query string isn't specified or an empty string (""), a match all query is performed. It returns all searchable documents, modified by any filters or search parameters used.

request := search.MatchAll().Build()

tip

Returning all documents is typically useful when used in conjunction with filter, or when performing a faceted search across the collection.

Project search query against specific fields

We can optionally project the search query against selected fields. Continuing previous example of searching for "running", we may not want to search in reviews field and avoid any unwanted results.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
                WithQuery("running").
                WithSearchFields("Name", "Labels").
                Build()

Refine the search results using filters

Applying filter on search results

Filters can be used to match against one or more field values in a collection. For example, to fetch all items from brand "adidas".

request := search.MatchAll().
                WithFilter(filter.Eq("Brand", "adidas")).
                Build()

Applying complex filter on search results

Let's adjust the query to only return items in price range of [40, 90). We can use filters in search to further refine the results.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
              WithQuery("running").
              WithSearchFields("Name", "Labels").
              WithFilter(
                  filter.And(filter.Gte("Price", 40), filter.Lt("Price", 90))).
              Build()

Supported filter operators

The following filter operators are supported:

$eq - Matches documents where the field value is equal to the provided value.
$lt - Matches documents where the field value is less than the provided value.
$lte - Matches documents where the field value is less than or equal to the provided value.
$gt - Matches documents where the field value is greater than the provided value.
$gte - Matches documents where the field value is greater than or equal to the provided value.
$not - Matches documents where the field value is not equal to the provided value.
$contains - Matches documents where the the provided value is a substring of the field value.
$regexp - Matches documents where the field value matches the given regex.
$and - Matches documents where all of the provided filters match.
$or - Matches documents where at least one of the provided filters match.

Faceted search

We can additionally retrieve the number of items a particular brand has and unique labels, that match our search query.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
              WithQuery("running").
              WithSearchFields("Name", "Labels").
              WithFilter(
                filter.And(filter.Gte("Price", 40), filter.Lt("Price", 90))).
              WithFacetFields("Brand", "Labels").
              Build()

Facets are a specific use-case of filters, and can only be used for filterable attributes.

Faceted content navigation UI

Common application for faceted search is to build UX with quick filters, that users can use to narrow search results in real-time. Faceted search interface presents intuitive content navigation to the end user.

Sorting the search results

Tigris lets you specify an order to sort the search results. We can specify a ranking order in our search query to have results sorted with more popular items appearing first.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
              WithQuery("running").
              WithSearchFields("Name", "Labels").
              WithSorting(sort.Descending("Popularity"))
              Build()

Many documents may have the same popularity score, we can specify additional user-defined sortable field to break the tie.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
              WithQuery("running").
              WithSearchFields("Name", "Labels").
              WithSorting(sort.Descending("Popularity"), sort.Descending("Reviews.Rating"))
              Build()

The results will be first sorted by value of popularity field, reviews.rating will be used to decide ordering if two matching documents have same popularity.

note

Documents can only be sorted by integer, number and date-time type of collection fields.

Specifying document fields to retrieve

Search query can be programmed to return only specific fields in a document in search results. We may only need to retrieve product name, brand and price for our interface.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
                WithQuery("running").
                WithIncludeFields("Name", "Brand", "Price").
                Build()

On the contrary, exclusion of fields is useful to exclude/hide potentially sensitive fields or internal metadata from the document. To include all fields except id and reviews from documents in search results.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
                WithQuery("running").
                WithExcludeFields("Id", "Reviews").
                Build()

note

Field selection does not impact searching, filtering and faceting capabilities for that field. For example, if reviews field is not included in documents in search results, it could still be used for text querying, filtering and/or faceting; just that matched documents won't include reviews field.

Case Insensitive Search Result Filtering

Search is case-insensitive but the filtering to restrict the search result is case-sensitive by default. Tigris supports Collation which allows you to specify string comparison rules for filtering on text fields. Set the case to ci in the collation object to make it case-insensitive. The following example is showing when you are searching for text "running" and you need to filter by brand field, but you don't care about the case.

request := search.NewRequestBuilder().
		WithQuery("running").
		WithFilter(filter.Eq("Brand", "Adidas")).
		WithOptions(&search.Options{
			Collation: &driver.Collation{
				Case: "ci",
			},
		}).
		Build()

Paginating through search results

Using page numbers

To retrieve a page of results, you can simply use Search method with page number and page size. Following query fetches the first page of results with page size set as 10

it, err := catalog.Search(ctx, &search.Request{
	Q:       "*",
	Options: &search.Options{PageSize: 5, Page: 1},
})
if err != nil {
	panic(err)
}

var res search.Result[model.Catalog]
for it.Next(&res) {
	for _, v := range res.Hits {
		fmt.Printf("%+v\n", v.Document)
	}
}

if it.Err() != nil {
	panic(it.Err())
}

Details

Output

&{Brand:AllSaints Id:72b8f1f4-9e91-43d9-8b8f-c26d7413990f Labels: Name:leather jacket Popularity:0 Price:200 Review:{Author:jane Rating:9.7}}
&{Brand:Puma Id:5af290ce-8c22-4460-9e33-9a9a869df8b9 Labels: Name:sneakers Popularity:0 Price:80 Review:{Author:joe Rating:8.5}}
&{Brand:Kate Spade Id:34e601bf-0c7b-4bea-8ab4-e4c4c7f44d54 Labels: Name:satchel bag Popularity:0 Price:120 Review:{Author:mary Rating:9.8}}
&{Brand:Levi's Id:2a2d47f2-099a-4391-90f8-d52c8a06a9a9 Labels: Name:denim jeans Popularity:0 Price:55 Review:{Author:joe Rating:7.5}}
&{Brand:Clarks Id:1df0a235-ecda-416f-b19a-7e89c1dcd2c8 Labels: Name:leather shoes Popularity:0 Price:110 Review:{Author:jane Rating:9.5}}

The hitsPerPage parameter controls the number of documents to include in a result page. The returned array of documents is accessible under hits key along with some search metadata.

var res search.Result[model.Catalog]
for it.Next(&res) {
	for _, v := range res.Hits {
		fmt.Printf("%+v\n", v.Document)
	}
}

Details

Output

&{Brand:adidas Id:a3e3c779-31cb-4d60-87cb-c4edc64ab4b7 Labels:clothing Name:running shorts Popularity:7 Price:35 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:0}}
&{Brand:nike Id:1aeb7c50-201d-42e8-8b77-23f3a3b86a89 Labels:shoes Name:running shoes Popularity:10 Price:89 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:0}}

Additionally, search result contains metadata object having current page and total pages along with other information.

var res search.Result[model.Catalog]
for it.Next(&res) {
	fmt.Printf("%+v\n", res.Meta)
}

Details

Output

{Found:12 TotalPages:3 Page:{Current:1 Size:5}}

Infinite scrolling

Infinite scrolling also loads data in pages, it is just that the UX is more fluid. Instead of using page number, an Iterator object can be obtained from search method call and processed iteratively.

it, err := catalog.Search(ctx, &search.Request{
	Q:       "*",
	Options: &search.Options{PageSize: 5},
})
if err != nil {
	panic(err)
}

var res search.Result[model.Catalog]
for it.Next(&res) {
	for _, v := range res.Hits {
		fmt.Printf("%+v\n", v.Document)
	}
	fmt.Printf("%+v\n\n", res.Meta)
}

if it.Err() != nil {
	panic(it.Err())
}

Details

Output

&{Brand:AllSaints Id:72b8f1f4-9e91-43d9-8b8f-c26d7413990f Labels: Name:leather jacket Popularity:0 Price:200 Review:{Author:jane Rating:9.7}}
&{Brand:Puma Id:5af290ce-8c22-4460-9e33-9a9a869df8b9 Labels: Name:sneakers Popularity:0 Price:80 Review:{Author:joe Rating:8.5}}
&{Brand:Kate Spade Id:34e601bf-0c7b-4bea-8ab4-e4c4c7f44d54 Labels: Name:satchel bag Popularity:0 Price:120 Review:{Author:mary Rating:9.8}}
&{Brand:Levi's Id:2a2d47f2-099a-4391-90f8-d52c8a06a9a9 Labels: Name:denim jeans Popularity:0 Price:55 Review:{Author:joe Rating:7.5}}
&{Brand:Clarks Id:1df0a235-ecda-416f-b19a-7e89c1dcd2c8 Labels: Name:leather shoes Popularity:0 Price:110 Review:{Author:jane Rating:9.5}}
{Found:12 TotalPages:3 Page:{Current:1 Size:5}}

&{Brand:Fossil Id:01a83c14-3d67-438c-b3cf-2b75a09c34d6 Labels: Name:leather wallet Popularity:0 Price:65 Review:{Author:john Rating:8.5}}
&{Brand:adidas Id:a3e3c779-31cb-4d60-87cb-c4edc64ab4b7 Labels: Name:running shorts Popularity:0 Price:35 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:7.5}}
&{Brand:nike Id:1aeb7c50-201d-42e8-8b77-23f3a3b86a89 Labels: Name:running shoes Popularity:0 Price:89 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:8.5}}
&{Brand:adidas Id:24034d4c-4de4-4ee7-8492-0d0f27b8d46b Labels: Name:sneakers shoes Popularity:0 Price:40 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:9}}
&{Brand:coach Id:4b4f7e06-025a-4b70-853f-0be7a38d221d Labels: Name:sling bag Popularity:0 Price:75 Review:{Author:alice Rating:9.2}}

{Found:12 TotalPages:3 Page:{Current:2 Size:5}}
&{Brand:coach Id:c7ec6a25-6a7a-4d9b-bced-6b40f6d097c6 Labels: Name:tote bag Popularity:0 Price:49 Review:{Author:olivia Rating:8.3}}
&{Brand:michael kors Id:2f7301f2-69b2-4b67-a3e3-9d9e7cda5948 Labels: Name:fiona handbag Popularity:0 Price:99.9 Review:{Author:alice Rating:7}}
{Found:12 TotalPages:3 Page:{Current:3 Size:5}}

As you can see, the iterator returns the same SearchResult object as in previous section with pagination metadata.

Example collection​

Searching for documents​

Phrase search​

Match all search query​

Project search query against specific fields​

Refine the search results using filters​

Applying filter on search results​

Applying complex filter on search results​

Supported filter operators​

Faceted search​

Sorting the search results​

Specifying document fields to retrieve​

Case Insensitive Search Result Filtering​

Paginating through search results​

Using page numbers​

Infinite scrolling​

Example collection

Searching for documents

Phrase search

Match all search query

Project search query against specific fields

Refine the search results using filters

Applying filter on search results

Applying complex filter on search results

Supported filter operators

Faceted search

Sorting the search results

Specifying document fields to retrieve

Case Insensitive Search Result Filtering

Paginating through search results

Using page numbers

Infinite scrolling