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Index external content

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Overview

Sitefinity can index data items that are managed on external systems.
For example, if you have blog posts, which are managed on an external system, by retrieving values of the posts' data fields, adding them to a search document, and updating the index, the blog posts are indexed in Sitefinity CMS.

The data content that you want to index must be compatible with Sitefinity CMS Search. This means that the fields that you want to participate in the index must be of type string, int, or DateTime.

To index external content in Sitefinity CMS indexes, you must create a search document for each indexed item and push it into the current Search Service implementation. A search document is the item that you want to be able to search. When search documents are indexed, they are displayed in search results and search suggestions in Sitefinity CMS.

Add a document to a search index

IMPORTANT: When creating the search document, ensure that it contains all the fields by which the search is performed. These fields correspond to the search field in the search result widget. For example, if you create a search result widget to search in Title and Content, then the search document you are creating must contain at least these two fields. For more information, see Search results widget.

The following sample demonstrates how to create a new search document, populate it with the required fields, and add it to an existing Sitefinity CMS index. You need to perform this operation every time you add a new external item or the external item has changed:

	using System;
	using System.Collections.Generic;
	using System.Globalization;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Publishing;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Services;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Services.Search;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Services.Search.Data;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Services.Search.Model;
	using Telerik.Sitefinity.Services.Search.Publishing;

	namespace SitefinityWebApp
	{
	public class ExternalIndexer
	{
	/// <summary>Creates a new search document and adds it to the search index.</summary>
	public void AddSearchDocument()
	{
	var fields = new List<IField>();

	// The identity field is mandatory.
	// The value of the identity field must be unique for each search document.
	// For example, Sitefinity CMS uses a combination of GUID and Language ID.
	var identityField = new Field
	{
	Name = Document.IdentityFieldName,
	Value = Guid.NewGuid().ToString() // Use lowercase only
	};
	fields.Add(identityField);

	// The title field is mandatory. It is used by Sitefinity CMS widgets
	var titleField = new Field
	{
	Name = PublishingConstants.FieldTitle,
	Value = "Here goes the title"
	};
	fields.Add(titleField);

	// The content field is mandatory. It is used by Sitefinity CMS widgets
	// You need to fetch the external content and add it as content here.
	string externalContent = ""; // supply the actual content here
	var externalContentField = new Field
	{
	Name = PublishingConstants.FieldContent,
	Value = externalContent
	};
	fields.Add(externalContentField);

	// The last modified field is mandatory.
	var lastModifiedField = new Field
	{
	Name = PublishingConstants.FieldLastModified,
	Value = DateTime.UtcNow
	};
	fields.Add(lastModifiedField);

	// We strongly recommend setting the language field.
	var languageField = new Field
	{
	Name = PublishingConstants.LanguageField,
	Value = CultureInfo.CurrentCulture.Name // this is just a sample, you need to set up the correct language for the content
	};
	fields.Add(languageField);

	// We recommend setting the link field. It enables site visitors to click on the link and go to the external content
	var linkField = new Field
	{
	Name = PublishingConstants.FieldLink,
	Value = "https://url.to.external.content"
	};
	fields.Add(linkField);

	// Create the search document containing the fields that we constructed
	var searchDocument = new Document(fields, identityField:identityField.Name);

	// Add the the created document to an existing search index
	// The name "index" is illustrative in this sample, you should use the actual search index name here.
	var searchDocumentsList = new List<IDocument>() { searchDocument };
	ServiceBus.ResolveService<ISearchService>().UpdateIndex(name:"index", searchDocumentsList);
	}
	}
	}

view raw searchapinewsample.cs hosted with ❤ by GitHub

NOTE: The code provided in this article demonstrates how to index external content and add it to an already existing Search index. Running it will create new index files if they are not present, but will not update Sitefinity configuration to add a new index.

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Create a search index that applies to group of pages