Using the IndexCustodian class for index operations
We highly recommended that you use the IndexCustodian
class for index operations instead of the ISearchIndex
interface. The ISearchIndex
interface contains the following API calls for index operations:
-
Rebuild
-
Update
-
Delete
-
Refresh
When you invoke these methods directly on the ISearchIndex
interface, it can cause various issues ranging from missing log entries to application crash due to a StackOverflowException
exception. Therefore, use these API calls from the IndexCustodian
class. When you use the IndexCustodian
class, the following things are different from the ISearchIndex
interface:
-
The
IndexCustodian
class runs the index operation in the context of a job. This ensures that the operation is atomic: no other rebuild or update operations can run for the same search index simultaneously. -
The
IndexCustodian
class triggers theindexing:start
andindexing:end
events. Sitecore relies on the events to keep instances in sync, and it also uses events to process some local changes.
To delete a specific document from a search index, for example, if the document is obsolete or when implementing some customization that deletes items in the context of an event disabler, execute Content Search API:
IndexCustodian.DeleteItem(ContentSearchManager.GetIndex("sitecore_web_index"), new SitecoreItemId(id);
or
IndexCustodian.DeleteItem(ContentSearchManager.GetIndex("sitecore_web_index"), new SitecoreItemUniqueId(itemUri));
Obsolete documents can also be removed from a search index using the index rebuild operation.
The 'Re-Index Tree' operation, also known as the Refresh operation, updates the search index based on the items that are still present in a Sitecore database. This operation does not delete any obsolete documents from a search index.