Serving

Once the crawling and indexing are done, we have all the information we need for a working search engine.

Now it is a matter of serving this information to the visitors to our customer’s website. In practice this is done in two ways: through the Pandosearch API and through our Searchbox widget.

Each has advantages and disadvantages depending on customer-specific wishes and needs and how a website is structured. That is why we discuss the choice between the Pandosearch API and Searchbox widget during intake and implementation.

The rest of this article explains the Pandosearch API and Searchbox widget. Finally, we will discuss the possibilities of splitting and/or combining search data.

Pandosearch API

The Pandosearch API is the most powerful way to use Pandosearch on a website. An API (Application Programming Interface) is a technical interface, which in this case Pandosearch uses to deliver search suggestions and search results to a website.

This type of interface requires development work on the customer’s side, because the customer needs to build their own search bar and search results page. This is often a deliberate choice for customers with a complex website (or websites). They usually have their own development and management teams. In that case, the flexibility offered by the Pandosearch API outweighs the use of our ready-made Searchbox widget.

See the API documentation for more information and a link to technical documentation.

Searchbox widget

In addition to the Pandosearch API, we also offer a ready-made search interface: the Searchbox. This also requires some technical knowledge, because it must be loaded into an existing website.

The Searchbox quickly provides a working search engine and offers direct access to Pandosearch’s most frequently used functions, such as autocomplete and autosearch and displaying a page of search results including page navigation. Customisation options, however, are limited compared to a direct Pandosearch API connection.

Technical documentation of the Searchbox is available upon request.

One or more search functions?

Apart from choosing between API or Searchbox, there is another choice to make: which information do you want visitors to search in certain places on your website(s)?

In the simplest situation, there is one site that we crawl and index and serve with one search function. However, Pandosearch can do much more. For example, we can crawl and index dozens of sites separately and then make them searchable together using a single search function. The reverse is also possible: all the information can be indexed together, but served separately.

We will discuss the wishes and possibilities during intake and implementation.