When you migrate to SearchStax Site Search with Drupal, your front-end technology and Drupal configurations determine which Site Search features affect search behavior. If you use Drupal Views, some Site Search features aren't available by default. They require deeper customizations or settings changes in the SearchStax Drupal module. This article explains which features are available when a search project doesn't use the SearchStax UI Kits.
Feature Availability Comparison
Use this table to compare feature availability by front-end technology.
Default availability with Drupal Views assumes that the SearchStax module isn't configured to ignore Drupal settings. Several UX features aren't available with Drupal Views without extensive Drupal customizations.
| Feature | SearchStax UI Kits | Drupal Views | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Default Availability | Required Drupal Configuration | ||
| Basic UX Components | |||
| Results Fields | ✅ | ❌ | Not usable with Drupal Views. Still recommended before using Site Search Preview. |
| Faceting | ✅ | ❌ | Not usable with Drupal Views. Still recommended before using Site Search Preview. |
| Sorting | ✅ | ❌ | Not usable with Drupal Views. Still recommended before using Site Search Preview. |
| Advanced UX Components | |||
| Auto-Suggest | ✅ | ❌ | Requires the Drupal Search API Autocomplete module. See Use Auto-Suggest with Drupal Views for configuration details. |
| Spell Check | ✅ | ❌ | Requires the Drupal Search API Spellcheck module to provide “Did you mean?” recommendations. Providing auto-corrections requires additional Drupal customizations. |
| Smart Answers | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Drupal customizations. See Add the Smart Answers UX Widget to a Custom Search UI for details. |
| Related Searches | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Drupal customizations. |
| External Promotions | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Drupal customizations. |
| Core Relevancy | |||
| Synonyms | ✅ | ✅ | Available by default when using Fulltext fields for search. Not compatible with nGram fields. |
| Stopwords | ✅ | ✅ | Available by default when using Fulltext fields for search. Not compatible with nGram fields. |
| Search Fields | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Ranking | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Data Filters | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Advanced Relevancy | |||
| Search Profiles | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Promotions | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Rules | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Location Search | ✅ | ❌ | Requires Parse mode and searched fields to be True in the SearchStax module. |
| Analytics | |||
| Search & Click Tracking | ✅ | ❌ | Requires the Analytics URL and access tokens to be added to the settings in the SearchStax module. |
Using SearchStax UI Kits
SearchStax UI Kits are ideal for typical site search use cases. UI Kits provide headless, component-based templates for faster implementation.
Available features:
- All SearchStax UX components, including Results Fields, Faceting, Sorting, Smart Answers, and Related Searches
- Core relevancy features (Stopwords, Synonyms)
- Advanced relevancy features (Search Fields, Data Filters, Ranking, Spell Check, Rules, Promotions, and Smart Match Assist)
- Auto-Suggest
Steps required:
- Configure all search settings in the SearchStax user interface
- Build a search page using SearchStax UI Kits. UI Kits integrate with the SearchStax
/emselectSearch API endpoint and the/emsuggestAuto-Suggest endpoint.
Using Drupal Views
This option is ideal if your search page requires deep front-end customizations. When using Drupal Views, you'll need to decide how to manage search relevancy.
The current SearchStax Drupal module lets you choose whether Drupal settings or Site Search configurations control supported search behavior. Use the Re-route searches via Site Search configurations setting as the decision point for the options below.
Continue Managing Relevancy in Drupal
Choose this approach when boosts, filters, and other search settings are applied in Drupal. Use this option when technical requirements prevent you from managing relevancy in the SearchStax user interface.
Available features:
Unavailable features:
- SearchStax UX components, including Results Fields, Faceting, Sorting, Smart Answers, and Related Searches
- Advanced relevancy features (Search Fields, Data Filters, Ranking, Spell Check, Rules, Promotions, and Smart Match Assist)
Steps required:
- Migrate to SearchStax and leave Re-route searches via Site Search configurations unchecked. When you leave this option unchecked, Drupal Search API, Drupal Views, or custom Drupal search logic will continue to control query parsing, searched fields, highlighting, or spellcheck behavior.
- Make sure languages and their corresponding stopwords and synonyms are configured correctly in SearchStax.
Migrate Relevancy Management to SearchStax
Choose this approach when marketing, communications, or content teams need to make quick relevancy changes in the SearchStax user interface.
Available features:
- Core relevancy features (Stopwords, Synonyms)
- Advanced relevancy features (Search Fields, Data Filters, Ranking, Spell Check, Rules, Promotions, and Smart Match Assist)
Unavailable features:
- SearchStax UX components, including Results Fields, Faceting, Sorting, Smart Answers, and Related Searches
Steps required:
- Migrate to SearchStax and check Re-route searches via Site Search configurations. This setting ensures that Drupal searches use the Site Search search handler and supported Site Search configurations.
- Select Parse mode and searched fields, Highlighting settings, and Spellcheck settings for the settings Site Search should control. Fulltext keys, filters, and paging parameters are still passed to SearchStax and aren't affected by this setting.
- Make sure languages are configured correctly in SearchStax for the following settings. Match the previous Drupal configuration as closely as possible:
- Stopwords
- Synonyms
- Spellcheck
- Search Fields
- Ranking
- Data Filters
- For each active language, validate data-driven spellcheck. If suggestions are missing or low quality, update schema copy-field rules and re-index before final sign-off.
Tip: See Upload Configurations for schema API workflows and Reducing Nested Clauses with Copy Fields for copy-field patterns. See When to Ignore Drupal Settings for SearchStax Site Search for details about the Drupal settings controlled by Site Search.
Use Auto-Suggest with Drupal Views
If you want to use the SearchStax Auto-Suggest feature, you can do so with an existing Drupal View.
Steps required:
- Make sure Analytics is enabled if your plan includes Analytics. Optionally, upload a starting dictionary. Install and enable Search API Autocomplete if your Drupal search page doesn't already use it.
- On the Search API server that uses the SearchStax Cloud with Token Auth connector, set Auto-suggest core to the Solr suggest core from your Auto-Suggest endpoint. Use the final path segment before
/emsuggest, then save the server configuration. - Configure Autocomplete for the search index or display that your search page uses so it sends suggestions to the SearchStax Auto-Suggest endpoint (
/emsuggest).
Other Benefits of Switching to UI Kits
Learn why UI Kits can be a better architecture choice for website search implementations that currently use Drupal Views. See Why You Should Move from Drupal Views to UI Kits for details.