Search configuration

Medialoopster uses two methods within its search in the browser user interface:

full-text
extended: via locally defined search field mappings

Full-text search

It allows you to search for values in assets without knowing which fields contain the value. The text will be searched within all assets of the currently selected asset type, production and device, as contained case-insensitive within the assets' fields, then the result displayed in the left panel.

By default, only the assets' names, and in addition the title, artist and album for audio assets, are searched, as defined by settings.DJANGO_SEARCH["PRIMARY_SEARCHFIELD"]. In case Elasticsearch is enabled, all fields are considered and the result sorted in addition by relevance:

first results have a definite match
the last results are for the input text modified with 1 character; this is called fuzzy search, useful when you mistyped 1 character.

It is thus more probable for an asset to turn up at the top of the search result, if more of its fields have been filled up.

Mode details in the user handbook.

Extended search - search field mappings

medialoopster administration → medialoopster → Search field mappings

They allow you to map an input search field to an asset's Elasticsearch key. Then the value entered by the user in one of the search boxes will be searched within assets for that corresponding asset field only. There is no fuzzyness involved here.

You must pre-populate the model via the administration interface with search criteria important for your company, for example: description, last added, last modified, is in archive, is in production, editor's name, cutter's name, title, artist, etc.

By default, only a few search field mappings will be functional: keywords, description, title, artist, album, genre. In case Elasticsearch is enabled, all search field mappings are functional.

Options

Name	Required	Description
Label	Yes	A text to be displayed in the browser as search criteria, for example `Last added`.
Enabled	No	Boolean value indicating if the criteria is visible on the browser user interface search. It is preferred to disable the mapping, rather than deleting it.
Type	Yes	Asset type for which the search criteria applies: `video, audio, image or project`. For example if the current display in the browser is for video assets, the extended search will show only video field mappings.
Elasticsearch key	Yes	Name of the asset field by which the search is to be made, for example `date_add` for the `Last added` label. The full list is here.
Input type	Yes	The input type: `text, date, AutoSuggest, select or boolean.`
Text: field lookups	No	Field indicating between what types of searches can the user choose: input text to be `contained`, matched `exactly`, or both.
Text: default field lookup	No	Default way of field lookup.
Select: select field	No	Select if the search is to be made for`License` or`Licensors`.
Boolean: true/false display value	No	How to display true / false in the search box, for the user to understand the use case better, for example as `Yes/No`, or `True/False`.

If you already added custom metadata to the system, you can use them as well as search fields, one custom metadata per search field mapping:

Type: the asset type of the custom metadata set
Elasticsearch key: meta_field_store.<custom_metadata_name>

If you already added keywords via the administration interface, you can add one search field mapping for all keywords:

Type: you can make one mapping for each of video, audio, image or project
Elasticsearch key: keywords
Input type: AutoSuggest; a drop down list with all the keywords of that type, existing in the system, will be suggested and automatically filtered when typing a search text; then all the videos with shots/sequences marked with that keyword, will be shown.