Explained: Attribute management

Attributes are the individual characteristics found in a document from a source. For example, if we look at a product source, the product could be 'Adidas Green Shoe', and the attribute would be the 'Product Name'.

You can add attributes to your source to add more value to your search results. For example, if you want to filter by 'Brand', add the 'Brand' attribute to your dataset.

In the app, you can manage attributes under 'Settings'. There are three basic functions:

1. Make attributes searchable or non-searchable

2. Sort searchable attributes by importance

3. Make attributes visible or invisible

Make attributes searchable or non-searchable: An attribute is searchable if it should count towards the sorting of your search results. If you want people to search by product name, you need to make this attribute searchable. If you don't want people to search by short description, because you don't have enough control over the content, make this attribute non-searchable.

In the example below, we search on the title of the film 'Shawshank'. This word is in the attribute 'Title'. As you can see, it is found.

To make an attribute non-searchable, go to 'Settings' in the app and select the 'Attributes' tab. By dragging attributes from the 'Searchable' column to the 'Non-searchable' column, you change their searchability.

If we then go back to the overview and search again on the title 'Shawshank', you can see that nothing is now found because the attribute 'Title' is excluded.

Sort searchable attributes by importance: By arranging the attributes in the 'Searchable' column, you can indicate which attributes are more important. If the 'Product Name' attribute is more important than the 'Brand' attribute, make sure 'Product Name' is placed above 'Brand'.

Make attributes visible or invisible: An attribute can be visible or invisible. You can indicate this by toggling the eye icon behind the attribute. If an attribute is invisible, it will not be included in the search results. Less data in the search results means faster results.The example below shows the source with all visible attributes.

To make attributes invisible, go to 'Settings' in the app and select the 'Attributes' tab. Then click on the eye icon behind the attribute you want to make invisible.

Below, you can see that attributes that are invisible have disappeared from the overview.