[opencms-dev] Using custom Lucene indexes to implement Channels (6a3)

[Daniel Rhoden]

Does this idea appeal to anyone?

Daniel Rhoden wrote:

> I am building an art-showcase site for a dear friend at my Church.  
> Dealing with her types of 'products' I quickly discovered that an 
> implementation of the Channel concept would be appropriate.
> A Channel Situation Example:
> Each piece of art will have its own page showcasing various 
> information about the piece.  However, there will be different summary 
> pages to locate the different types of art.  In this particular 
> situation, a single piece of art can be classified differently 
> (multiple channel subscription).  Its SUBJECT can be 'still_life', its 
> STYLE can be 'abstract', its MEDIUM can be 'watercolor', etc.  I want 
> to create different summary pages showing me all the art work that is 
> in category channel x (for example, show me all art that is 
> 'watercolor').
>
> Implementation Details:
> I have extended 4 search package classes to allow me to index custom, 
> but specific, vfs resource properties (not just title, keywords, 
> description, ...).  This might be useful in its own accord.  However, 
> in this situation, I used it to index properties "search_1" through 
> "search_10", giving me 10 different classification subjects to index, 
> and thus search.  I wanted to leave it general so it could be reused.  
> Rather than defining the property "STYLE" and keying in the different 
> possible values (realistic, abstract, expressionist_contemporary, 
> impressionist, experimental) for that art page, I just write down that 
> property "search_2" will be used to track the art's STYLE.  When it 
> comes time to built an overview page showing me all the art that is 
> impressionist, my custom 'search' (no user input) page looks only in 
> the field 'search_2' of its index for the exact phrase that I use to 
> indicate that style ('impressionist' in this case).  Boom, I get the 
> List of art that the user is looking for on the Style summary page.  
> The "channels" folder is never used.
>
> I would love to get some feedback on this concept.  My classes work 
> and I am happy to share them for further development (if determined 
> practical/useful).
>
> Thanks,
>
> Daniel Rhoden
>
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> This mail is send to you from the opencms-dev mailing list
> To change your list options, or to unsubscribe from the list, please 
> visit
> http://mail.opencms.org/mailman/listinfo/opencms-dev
>