Global Search

DATA GATHERING

Site Information

• Algolia vs Elastic
• Inside Algolia Search Engine

Algolia Build Videos

• Algolia YouTube Channel
• Algolia build 101 for php developers

Algolias Ranking Formula

Notes:

• most other search engines(Solr, Elastic) inherit their ranking from an Engine called Lucene developed in 1999
  • For. agiven Query a Lucene based engine will use its algorithm to compute a single score per results and order all results according to those values.
  • Pure-textual relevance and other paramaters are mixed into this hard-to-debug numeric value
• ALgolia uses a tie-breaking algorithm
• "n" Rules applied in succession
• The tie-breaking algotithm is called "The Ranking Formula"

The Ranking Formula

8 Rules applied in succession

• initially all matching records are sorted by the first criterion e.g. Rule1(Color)
• If any records are tied those are then sorted by the second criterion e.g Rule2(Edge)
• If there are still records tied then those are then sorted according to the third Criterion and so.

Here is Algolias 8 ranking/sorting rules

• Rule 1 - TYPO
• Rule 2 - GEO
• Rule 3 - WORDS
• Rule 4 - FILTERS
• Rule 5 - PROXIMITY
• Rule 6 - ATTRIBUTE
• Rule 7 - EXACT
• Rule 8 - CUSTOM
  • This one is key for injecting our own business data

Tie Breaking Algorithm Strengths

• Ranking is clear and easy to understand No More black box
• Modify rules order and add custom rules

Exploring the engine

Here are three examples which should highlight how powerful and Debt free Algolia really is

• Ecommerce
• Media
• Mobile

Ecommerce.
As a User looking to buy a new iPhone I want to see the latest version at the top as opposed to the old one or some accessories