SharePoint search display templates made easy

Madalina Rogoz — Mon, 23 Jun 2014 10:49:47 +0000

One of the most interesting features in SharePoint 2013 are the display templates. This blog post will describe how to customize a search display template in order to show the item created date.

The display templates are located in the site collection root site, under the _catalogs/Display Templates folder. Each template has two files: the html file and a javascript file. The javascript file is the one that SharePoint uses, while the html exists in order to make it easier for us developers to create and customize the display templates. Once an html file has been modified, SharePoint generates the corresponding updated javascript file, so the process is fully automated.

So what are the steps involved in creating a new display template?

In SharePoint designer, after opening the root website, navigate to the Display Templates folder. Here, in the Search subfolder, you will find the display templates that SharePoint uses for many types of results – documents, web sites, people and others. Choose a display template as a starting point for your own, depending on the result type that you are targeting, copy it and then rename it. Once saved, you will see that SharePoint has already generated the corresponding javascript file. Modify the html file as you wish. What is left to do now is to link the template to an actual result type, so that SharePoint knows what to associate your display template to. This can be done through the interface, by navigating to Site Settings – Search Result Types.

Let’s take it step by step.

Duplicating an existing display template

Open the site collection with SharePoint designer. Navigate to the Display Templates folder under _catalogs\masterpage\display templates. Here you will find some Folders that SharePoint uses to group Display Templates together.

The Word item template is in the Search folder. Make a copy of the Item_Word.html and rename it to ComperioItem_Word.html

Edit the file and inside you will see some html and javascript code.

Edit the title field so that your custom template has a different display name than the original one.

The tag contains some properties of the template. Some important properties are:

TargetControlType – tells SharePoint what the template is used for (search results, web parts, filters)
ManagedPropertyMapping – contains a list of the managed properties that are or can be used by the current template

The tag contains the rendering logic for the display template.

The template can only recognize the managed properties that are listed in the header. To use another managed property, add it here. We are using the Created property that displays the document created date.

 
'Title':'Title','Path':'Path', [………..] , ‘Created’:’Created’

Now that the template is aware of the property, you can use it by adding it to the body. Add the line below in the Body of the rendering template:

 _#= ctx.CurrentItem.Created =#_

Mapping the display template to a result type

Now we are going to manually link the display template to a result type, so that we can see that it works.

In order for SharePoint to use your custom template, it needs to know of it. So navigate to Site Actions – Site Settings and under Site Collection Administration choose Search Result Types. Create a New Result Type for your template like below:

Choose a Name
Choose Microsoft Word as content to match
Choose your custom display template

Now go to the results page and search for a word document. The results should display a date looking like this:

We have only been scratching the surface and a lot more customization can be done here, for example formatting the date value in javascript by using a function like format(“yyyy-MM-dd”) on a Date object. Combined, SharePoint and javascript have (almost) endless possibilities.

Happy coding!

Ultimate Reading List for Search UX Practitioners

Vegard Sandvold — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 12:48:07 +0000

Enthusiastic search technology and UX practitioners have no shortage of inspiring books to adorn their bedside tables. Countless books on information architecture, interaction design, user testing and design documentation could keep you occupied well into the next wave of occupational fads.

If you have read everything else of interest – and want to pump yourself up on enterprise search – look no further. We have compiled our ultimate reading list for search enthusiasts, a comprehensive collection of the most interesting books on search thinking and search doing written to date. Hopefully you’ll find something worth reading here aswell.

We would love to hear what you think of these book, and please feel free to share your own suggestions in the comments below. Happy reading!

Search Thinking

Lovely books on the softer, more fluffy side of enterprise search.

Everything Is Miscellaneous by David Weinberger – the human side of information, and why tagging is better than classification.

Ambient Findability by Peter Morville – search in a wider perspective, and possible futures.

The Search by John Battelle – the story of how Google revolutionized web search and Internet business.

Search Doing

Rock-solid and down-to-earth practical advice on search design and implementation.

Search Patterns by Peter Morville – the definitive guide to design patterns for search.

Search Users Interfaces by Marti A. Hearst – a textbook packed with useful examples of search user interface designs.

Designing Search: UX Strategies for eCommerce Success by Greg Nudelman – the how-to on eCommerce search design and implementation, with a lot of helpful guidelines.

Search Analytics by Louis Rosenfeld – a thorough and comprehensive guide to working with your search logs.

Faceted Search by Daniel Tunkelang – a crash course in one of the most enigmatic challenges of enterprise search.

Exploratory Search: Beyond the Query-Response Paradigm by Ryen W. White & Resa A. Roth – the academic perspective on information seeking behavior and Human-Computer Information Retrieval (HCIR).

Update: