Catalog product search

The catalog search API provides the functionality for finding Optimizely Commerce products via two methods: search providers and ICatalogSystem. 

Search providers

Catalog Search API uses an index-based search engine to provide powerful search functionalities. Optimizely Commerce includes the following search providers:

• LuceneSearchProvider (the default search provider for the EPiServer.Commerce.Core package)
• Search & Navigation SearchProvider (a separate package)

Catalog Search API is used mostly on the front-end and provides advanced functionality for website visitors.

Implementation examples

The following examples show how to implement search features.

Simple catalog entry search

CatalogEntrySearchCriteria criteria = new CatalogEntrySearchCriteria();
  criteria.SearchPhrase = "canon";
  SearchManager manager = new SearchManager(AppContext.Current.ApplicationName);
  SearchResults results = manager.Search(criteria);

CatalogEntrySearchCriteria criteria = new CatalogEntrySearchCriteria();
  criteria.SearchPhrase = "fanon";
  SearchManager manager = new SearchManager(AppContext.Current.ApplicationName);
  SearchResults results = manager.Search(criteria);
  if (results.TotalCount == 0)
    {
      criteria.IsFuzzySearch = true;
      criteria.FuzzyMinSimilarity = 0.7f;
      results = manager.Search(criteria);
    }
  Console.Write("Total Results: " + results.TotalCount.ToString();

// Get catalog lists
CatalogDto catalogs = system.GetCatalogDto();

// Create Entry Criteria
CatalogEntrySearchCriteria criteria = new CatalogEntrySearchCriteria();

// Bind default catalogs if none found
if (criteria.CatalogNames.Count == 0)
  {
    if (catalogs.Catalog.Count > 0)
      {
        foreach (CatalogDto.CatalogRow row in catalogs.Catalog)
          {
            if (row.IsActive &&
              row.StartDate <= FrameworkContext.Current.CurrentDateTime &&
              row.EndDate >= FrameworkContext.Current.CurrentDateTime)
                {
                  criteria.CatalogNames.Add(row.Name);
                }
          }
      }
  }

// Define phrase we want to search
criteria.SearchPhrase = "canon";

// Create a manager
SearchManager manager = new SearchManager(AppContext.Current.ApplicationName);

SearchResults results = null;

// Define sort parameter
criteria.Sort = new SearchSort("DisplayName");

// Perform search
results = manager.Search(criteria);

Assert.IsTrue(results.TotalCount > 0, "No hits were found in Lucene index.");

// Get IDs we need
int[] resultIndexes = results.GetIntResults(0, 10 + 5); 
// padding added to accomodate entries that might have been deleted since last indexing

// Retrieve actual entry objects, with no caching
Entries entries = CatalogContext.Current.GetCatalogEntries(resultIndexes, false, new TimeSpan(), new CatalogEntryResponseGroup(CatalogEntryResponseGroup.ResponseGroup.CatalogEntryFull));
entries.TotalResults = results.TotalCount;
Assert.IsTrue(entries.TotalResults > 0, "No entries were returned from the database.");

// Get catalog lists
CatalogDto catalogs = system.GetCatalogDto();
foreach (CatalogDto.CatalogRow catalog in catalogs.Catalog)
  {
    string catalogName = catalog.Name;
    // Get Catalog Nodes
    CatalogNodeDto nodes = system.GetCatalogNodesDto(catalogName);
    foreach (CatalogNodeDto.CatalogNodeRow node in nodes.CatalogNode)
      {
        CatalogSearchParameters pars = new CatalogSearchParameters();
        CatalogSearchOptions options = new CatalogSearchOptions();
        options.CacheResults = true;
        pars.CatalogNames.Add(catalogName);
        pars.CatalogNodes.Add(node.Code);
        var entries = CatalogContext.Current.FindItemsDto(pars,
        options);
      }
  }