Crawl and Index > Collections

Use the Crawl and Index > Collections page to perform the following tasks:

• Creating a new collection
• Editing a collection
• Exporting and importing a collection configuration
• Deleting a collection

A collection lets your users search over a specific part of the index. For example, you may want to create a products collection or a human_resources collection that supports searches that are only within the products or human resources part of your index. The Page Layout Helper lets you automatically modify the search page to include a menu for search by collection.

The crawler accesses and indexes the URLs and URL patterns that you entered in the Crawl and Index > Crawl URLs page. The resulting index is the default_collection that you see on the Crawl and Index > Collections page.

You, as administrator, can create collections of documents that are subsets of the complete index. Each collection is defined by a group of URL patterns that encompasses the URLs of the documents in the collection. You can also import a collection configuration that was previously exported from the system.

In addition to the collections you create, the search appliance creates the default_collection, which contains the complete index. You can expose the default_collection to your users or not, as you wish.

The maximum number of collections for a search appliance is 200. Having more than this number of collections can cause serving to fail. The solution for this problem is to reset the index.

Before Starting these Tasks

Before creating or working with collections, perform the following tasks:

• Crawl and index your content
• Create a front end where you can edit the collections-based drop-down menu (a pull-down menu on the search box that enables users to select a collection to search )

Creating a New Collection

To create a collection:

1. Click Crawl and Index > Collections.
2. In the Collection Name text box, type a name for the new collection.
   Collection names can be up to 200 characters long and can contain only alphanumerics (ASCII characters only), underscores, and dashes. A name cannot begin with a dash.
3. Either leave the Empty Click on the Edit link afterwards to configure the collection option selected or click the Import configuration from file option.
4. Click Create Collection.
   The new collection's name appears in the list of collections and is selected.
5. Edit the collection to add Included patterns to the new collection to make it functional
6. Add a drop-down menu to search by collection.
   For information about adding a drop-down menu, see "Adding a Menu to Search by Collection" in "Creating the Search Experience: Customizing the User Interface," which is linked to the Google Search Appliance help center.

Editing a Collection

Editing a collection consists of defining URL patterns for content to include in the collection, as well as URL patterns for content to exclude.

To edit a collection:

1. Click the Edit link next to the name of the collection collection that you want to edit.
2. Configure the collection by using the Crawl and Index > Collections > <collection_name> page in the Admin Console.
   For information about using this page, refer to Help Center > Crawl and Index > Collections > <collection_name>.
3. Update the collections-based drop-down menu in a front end.

Exporting and Importing a Collection Configuration

If you have a collection that is set up in a way that you'd like to reuse, you can export its configuration and import that configuration for a new collection.

The collection configuration file is an XML file that contains:

• Entries in Include Content Matching the Following Patterns
• Entries in Do Not Include Content Matching the Following Patterns

1. Click the Export Configuration link next to the name of the collection whose configuration you want to reuse.
2. In the Download dialog box, click Save to save the file, noting the location of the file you are saving. (The configuration file's name is collection_name.xml).
3. Under Create a New Collection, type a name for the new collection.
4. Select the Import configuration from file option and use its box to type the configuration's path (or browse for the file). If you browse, find the file, highlight it, and click Open.

Deleting a Collection

To delete a collection:

1. Click Crawl and Index > Collections.
2. Click the Delete link next to the collection you want to delete.
   A confirmation box appears.
3. Click OK.
4. Update the collections-based drop down menu in a front end.

Subsequent Task

After you add or remove a collection, you must update the front end XSLT code. This ensures that the collection-based drop-down menu reflects the collection name changes, and that all forms using the collections are updated.  

To update the collections-based drop-down menu in a front end:

1. In the Admin Console, go to Serving > Front Ends.
2. For the front end affected by the collection changes, select Edit.
3. Use either the Page Layout Helper or the XSLT Stylesheet Editor to edit the XSLT stylesheet and incorporate the changes.

For More Information

For more information about collections, see the following documents, which are linked to the Google Search Appliance help center:

• "Using Collections" in "Administering Crawl: Advanced Topics"
• "Segmenting the Index" in "Creating the Search Experience: Best Practices"