1. Creating hierarchical facets

Implement a hierarchical facet strategy

Hierarchical facets let you combine filters in a search, and resolve the problem of an increased number of facet values. To improve system performance and efficiency, implement a hierarchical facet strategy to help your customers navigate your content collection.

To implement hierarchical facets:

  1. In your list of facets, identify any facets that, when combined, yield items that can be classified under others. For example, brand and model.

  2. Create a new facet named by concatenating the names of the facets identified in step 1. For example, brand_model, a concatenated string of brand and model with a _ as delimiter.

  3. Add the new facet as an attribute to the entity and then configure this attribute for use as a facet.

  4. Update the source's extractor logic to set a concatenated string of the facet values. For example, of brand and model, separated by a _.

    For example, Ford_Focus and Ford_Kuga.

  5. Publish the updated source and trigger a reindex.

  6. After the application or page loads, do the following:

    • Request data for your widget for all facets and values. In this example, that is widget rfkid_7,

      Remember to run this request at least once per session.

    • On response, locally store the returned facet objects.

    • Using the data in the lists of facets and facet values, build the required user interface.

  7. Using the following code block as a reference, update your data request for widget rfkid_7.

    {
    "context": {
        "locale": {
            "country": "us",
            "language": "en"
        }
    },
    "widget": {
        "items": [
            {
                "rfk_id": "rfkid_7",
                "entity": "car",
                "sources": [
                    "981588"
                ],
                "search": {
                 "limit":100,
                    "content": {
                        "fields": [
                            "brand_model",
                            "year",
                            "city"
                        ]
                    },
                    "facet": {
                        "max": 100,
                        "types": [
 
                            {
                                "name": "brand_model",
                                "filtering_options": ["hard_filters", "other_facet_values"]
                            },
                             {
                                "name": "year",
                                "filtering_options": ["hard_filters", "other_facet_values"]
                            },
                            {
                                "name": "city",
                                "filtering_options": ["hard_filters", "other_facet_values"]
                            }
                        ]
                    }
                }
            }
        ]
    }
 }

  8. From that request, using the response for the widget, parse the items of content to determine the count of individual facets. For example, by using the brand_model field, count brand and model in a response with the following facets:

                …
	"facet": [
	                {
	                    "name": "brand_model",
	                    "value": [
	                        {
	                            "id": "facetid_eyJ0eXBlIjoiZXEiLCJuYW1lI…",
	                            "text": "Ford_Focus",
	                            "count": 6
                        },
                        {
                            "id": "facetid_eyJ0eXBlIjoiHZAiLCoidHlwZ…",
                                "text": "Ford_Kuga",
                            "count": 2
                        }
		  ]
		  …

    In this example, the index has 8 Ford cars, comprised of 6 Focus and 2 Kuga.

  9. Populate the list of facets created in step 6. For example:

    []Ford (8)
    []Focus (6)
    []Kuga (2)
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