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One of the key features of Ataccama ONE is a powerful search engine that lets business users easily find what they are looking for while also allowing technical users to execute complex search queries.
There are two areas for search:
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Global search - This full-text search is enabled on the whole application and is a good starting point for searching data assets.
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Search in navigation sections - This search combines full-text and filtering capabilities to query data assets. Search options are restricted to the currently selected navigation section. For example, using the search bar in Catalog Items only return results found within that entity and configured areas of search on this entity.
If you reached this page from the application, it means that the full-text search is not configured on the entity you were browsing. If this is the case, proceed with Search when full-text search is not configured. |
Overview
Global search
Global search is the starting point for search on cataloged assets. This lets you search in any preconfigured entities (such as catalog items, terms, sources) while leveraging an easy entry point and search suggestions.
To include custom entities in this search, you need to configure the search settings. See Full-text Search Configuration. |
Global search is supported on:
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The main entity listings that refer directly to the metadata. For example, it works on the Terms tab but not on the Business Terms tab since the entities there don’t refer to the metadata directly but to the Terms tab instead.
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The flat listing views of hierarchical entities.
Global search is based on the full-text search technology where all search requests are processed as text strings. For details, see How full-text search works.
How full-text search works
When using global search, if your search contains more than one word, each word is processed as a standalone query with the OR operator between the queries.
For example, searching for mail contact
returns all findings the contain the word mail
or contact
.
When searching in tabs, you can choose whether your query should be split (with the OR operator applied between queries) or treated as a single request. By default, your search query is processed at once regardless of how many words it contains (that is, the whole expression is searched as a single query).
If you prefer to search using multiple queries at the same time, enter your query and press Enter or select the search icon. Next, enter another query in the search bar and press Enter again. Repeat this as many times as needed.
Consider the following when searching:
* Search is case-insensitive.
* Non-alphanumeric characters are used as delimiters.
* Stop words are not considered (for example, a
, the
, is
, are
).
* Search terms are stemmed using algorithmic stemmers.
* Hyphenated words are supported.
* Concatenated words are supported (for example, deliveryaddress
, postalcode
).
* There is support for search-as-you-type (for example, cust
would return customers
and custom
).
The relevance of results is determined using the default full-text search settings with fixed boosting.
For example, when searching catalog items, the results might be displayed in the following order, starting from the highest to lowest priority:
-
Catalog item name.
-
Term name, regardless of where it is assigned.
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Attribute name.
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Everything else.
Search in tabs
When searching in a particular navigation section (that is, what you see in the application as tabs in the left navigation menu), there are three search modes available:
-
Full-text search in navigation sections uses the same full-text search technology as in Global search. The search levels and locations can be customized (this is done in Global Settings > Search Configurations): it is supported on the same entity types as Global search, that is, the main listing entities with direct reference to the metadata and the flat listing views of hierarchical entities.
-
Full-text search legacy mode is powered by Metadata Management Module (MMM) and used as a fallback option when the default full-text search is unavailable or not configured. It searches through asset names in entity listings and cannot be configured.
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AQL search is the in-house query language for more complex search requests on entity listings.
In navigation sections, you can also filter entities by state:
-
Published: Assets in the approved (published) state. On these entities, the full-search is enabled by default where possible.
If you see an option to choose between the legacy full-text search and AQL search, it means the full-text search is either turnedd off in Global Settings or is unavailable for this location. In this case, proceed with Search when full-text search is not configured. -
Unpublished: Assets in the draft state, including newly created, deleted, or changed assets. Here you can only use the legacy full-text search, see Search when full-text search is not configured.
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All: Assets in both published and draft states. The full-text search is not enabled here, see Search when full-text search is not configured.
How to use global search
To open Global search, select the magnifier icon in the left navigation menu or press Ctrl+K.
Start typing in the search bar to display search suggestions. Enter at least three characters for the search to start.
For each search suggestion, you can see the asset name and the type.
If your input is empty, you see the navigation sections suggested instead. Select a section to open the global search screen for it. |
If you see the asset you’re looking for in the list of results, select it to open the asset.
The names of matching assets are highlighted. |
If there are no matches, press Enter to open the extended search results.
Here the results are split by asset type and you can see how many matches there are for each asset type. By default, the following tabs are shown:
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Catalog item
-
Term
-
Rule
-
Monitoring project
-
Source
-
Lookup item
These entities have Global search configured by default. |
On some tabs, you can use filters to further narrow down the search results. The options available are updated based on the current search results.
Filters are available on the following:
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Catalog items: Filter by assigned terms, data source, location, the number of attributes and records, or detected anomalies.
-
Monitoring projects: Filter by assigned terms, the number of detected anomalies and structure checks.
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Sources: Filter by the number of catalog items they contain.
You can duplicate catalog items, terms, and rules directly from the search results. In the three dots menu of the asset you want to copy, select Duplicate. This opens a new browser tab where you can review or modify the metadata of the duplicated asset. Once you’re done, select Save and then publish the changes. Refresh the browser tab with the search results to display the new item in the list. |
How to search in navigation sections
To search in the navigation sections, navigate to the tab you want to search in (for example, Catalog Items). Optionally, filter the assets by state first.
For a refresher about asset states, see Search in tabs. |
Enter your search query in the search bar (1). The relevant parts of your query are highlighted in the results.
To get a better understanding of why some results are shown instead of others, see How full-text search works. |
To narrow down the search results further, apply filters.
If a filter is grayed out, it means no matches are found in your results. If you combine several different filters, the operator between them is AND. However, you cannot select multiple values from the same filter: in this case, the operator is always OR.
In filters, (Blank) can be used in combination with other selected items, Any cannot. |
To remove an individual filter, expand it and select Clear (2). To remove all filters, select Clear filters (3).
If your search returned no results, you can remove all conditions defined by selecting Clear search criteria.
A number of predefined filters is available for each entity. These can be configured if needed. See Configuring Full-text Search. |
Sort search results
Sort your search results to prioritize those relevant to your request.
When you sort search results manually, this overrides the default sorting by relevance. The default sorting is applied again after you clear the current sort.
To sort, use the arrow icon next to the column you want to sort by:
-
To sort in descending order, click once.
-
To sort in ascending order, click twice.
-
To remove sorting, click three times.
Search on hierarchical entities
When the full-text search is configured on entities that contain hierarchies, such as rules or terms, there are multiple options for viewing and sorting search results.
The full-text search in navigation sections is only available with the Flat listing view. In other views, the legacy full-text search or AQL search are used instead. See Search when full-text search is not configured. |
To change the view, go to the entity listing tab, for example, Terms. In the listing view options, select one from the following:
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Flat listing - General listing of all items.
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Backup of - Items that are another’s item backup.
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Is Backed up in - The original items that have a backup in other locations.
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Parent of - Items that have children.
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Child of - Items that have parent items.
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Copy of - Items that are copies of other items.
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Sample of - Samples of other items.
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Is in Sample - Items that are used in samples.
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Derived in - Items from which another item is derived.
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Derived from - Items that are derived from another item.
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Contributes to - Items that contribute to other items in other locations.
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Is contributed in - Items that are used as contributors.
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Domain of - Items that are used as domains for other items.
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Is in Domain - Items that are used in other domains.
Search when full-text search is not configured
To see which entities have the full-text search configured, go to Global Settings > Search configurations. |
If the full-text search is not available for some entity types, you can use one of the following:
-
Legacy full-text search: Searches asset names in entity listings and cannot be configured. For more details, see Search in tabs.
When using the legacy full-text search, you can choose whether your query should be split (with the OR operator applied between queries) or treated as a single request. By default, your search query is processed at once regardless of how many words it contains (that is, the whole expression is searched as a single query).
If you prefer to search using multiple queries at the same time, enter your query and press Enter or select the search icon. Next, enter another query in the search bar and press Enter again. Repeat this as many times as needed.
-
AQL search: An in-house query language that covers basic search and filtering functionality through easy-to-write conditions. AQL filters the entities by various parameters that you define in the query. To learn more, see Search using AQL Expressions.
To select which search is used, expand the menu in the search bar and select Full-text search (legacy) or AQL search (or AQL Advanced Filtering) depending on your use case.
These search options are also available for entities for which the full-text search is configured. To access them, select the All tab on the entity listing screen. |
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