By default, we are
able to display query results in our own page with the Search Core Results web
part . Basically the search query can be built in two ways:
- UserQuery: to get a query
from current user we need a Search Box or Advanced Search Box web part.
After typing the query, both of these webparts give the query to the URL
QueryString, and the Search Core Results webpart show the results
according to these parameters.
For example: http://mymoss/sites/customsearch/default.aspx?k=42 means the user typed the
query "42". - FixedQuery: If we want to
display results from a fix query, without user interaction, we can set the
webpart parameter "FixedQuery" of Search Core Results.
For exaple we can display all of presentations with extension ppt or
pptx.
Unfortunately we
don't have possibilities to build FIxedQuery dinamically, without programming.
We can create a new webpart which inherits from Search Core Results, and
override the FixedQuery, but it needs development efforts.
It would be nice to
do this when e.g. we want to know who has birthday today, or what documents are
checked out to the current user. These are very simple questions, can be
typical queries with other scenarios as well.
Dynamic
query
In my example I will
build the query by the current URL. I'd like to know what contents link this
URL in an other site collection.
Our search settings
are scopes are ready to use, we need just build the query and display the
results.
Let's go! On your
current site create a Search Core Results webpart, but DON'T set it to
FixedQuery! Here is the surprise: I'm going to use the UserQuery mode, without
search boksz or any input field. If we can set the query string parameters in
the URL (see above), the results are shown in the Results webpart (42). OK, but
how can we set this "k" parameter automatically, without user input
and programming?
The first thing we
can imagine: insert the parameter into the links referred to this site. The
idea is good, but we have two problems with it:
- It's definitely not too nice
if we create URL with long parameters, that could be calculated
automatically.
- We can insert the parameter
into our own links, but inside the SharePoint it won'be work. For example
we use the breadcrumb navigation, the parameters won't be inserted to end
of our site's URL.
Well, what can we
do? We could insert the parameter's creation into the given site, but without
user input. The most optimal solution would be if we can build the creation
into the Search Core Results itself.
The solution: edit
the XSL behind the Search Core Result webpart! In this XSL, we can find the
parameters of displaying, and the text rendered if the results set is empty
("No results matching your search were found."), or if the parameter
is empty or missing. We can profit from it!
Look for the
following part of the XSL:
1:
<xsl:template name="dvt_1.noKeyword">
2:
<span class="srch-description">
3:
4:
<xsl:choose>
5:
<xsl:when test="$IsFixedQuery">Please set the 'Fixed
Query' property for the webpart.</xsl:when>
6:
<xsl:otherwise>Enter one or more words to search for in the search
box.</xsl:otherwise>
7:
</xsl:choose>
8:
9:
</span>
10:
</xsl:template>
This part of XSL is
responsible for handling empty parameters. The 'otherwise' tag handles
FixedQuery - but it doesn't fit to our needs, so let's see the first, xsl:when
branch. If we don't have any query (yet), so the parameter 'k' is missing from
the Query String, the following tag will be active:
6:
<xsl:otherwise>Enter one or more words to search for in the search
box.</xsl:otherwise>
Well, how can we
persuade the WebPart to fill in parameter 'k' automatically instead of display
this message? Tadadaaa! Javascript! We're building the query in Javascript,
build the full URL with requeires QueryString, and redirect the current page to
this one. After redirection the XSL will go to an other tag, because the
parameter 'k' won't be empty!
1: <xsl:otherwise>
2: <script type="text/javascript">
3:
4: var kparam =
location.pathname.substring(location.pathname.indexOf("site_"),
location.pathname.indexOf("/Default.aspx"));
5: window.navigate(location.pathname
+ "?k=" + kparam);
6:
7: </script>
8: </xsl:otherwise>
Fortunately, we can
do almost everything on client side by Javascript, so we can build our query by
many other parameters. Very nice, isn't it?