Index Sitecore content

Important

The Index Sitecore content documentation section applies to Sitecore XP and Sitecore XM instances. For information on indexing Sitecore XC content, see Indexing catalog items.

Queries in Sitecore are driven by search indexes. Coveo queries are no exception to the rule. Once you have installed Coveo for Sitecore, the first thing to do is to index your Sitecore content to make it searchable.

The default configuration of the master and web indexes might not match the structure of your Sitecore content tree. You might need to change your index crawling root to fit your needs (see Change the crawling root of an index).

Filter your content

When your crawling roots are properly set, your focus then turns to ensuring only the items you want to make searchable are indexed. The Filter your content section provides you with information on the default filtering in Coveo for Sitecore, and on the various methods available to filter out other unwanted items (see Filter your content).

Indexing leading practices

Now that you’re targeting the right content to index, you’re ready to start indexing. You don’t always need to initiate indexing processes because Coveo for Sitecore leverages Sitecore index update strategies to automatically keep your indexes up to date. Indexing is a resource-intensive operation. Hence, when you need force an index update, you want to choose the most suitable method. The Indexing leading practices section contains all the information you need to ensure that you efficiently update your search indexes.

The Indexing leading practices section is also meant to help you understand and monitor the different phases of the indexing process through the Sitecore log entries, and manage your indexes in the Coveo Administration Console.

Index fields and page content

For an optimal search experience, you want to index fields and their values as well as the HTML representation of your Sitecore items.

The Index fields section guides you through the field indexing process, from selecting the fields you want to index to configuring field settings for use in field value-based search interface features. This section also aims to help you make sense of field name translations, the search result title selection sequence, and how Coveo for Sitecore resolves hosts for the clickable URI of your Sitecore items, both at indexing and at query time (see Index fields).

Indexing Sitecore item page content makes that HTML free-text searchable and lets you to display this HTML content in the Coveo Quick View component, directly in your search results. See the Index page content section for the various page content indexing options available in Coveo for Sitecore, their advantages and drawbacks (see Index page content).

Coveo for Sitecore and Sitecore access rights

Coveo for Sitecore handles Sitecore access rights to ensure that a Sitecore user that doesn’t have access to a given item in Sitecore isn’t able to access that item through a Coveo for Sitecore search either. The How Coveo for Sitecore handles Sitecore access rights article explains how Coveo for Sitecore maps Sitecore access rights to Coveo permission levels (see Handling of Sitecore Access Rights).