This feature is available in Prospector versions 3.2.2318 beta and newer.
There are situations when it's easier, or more desirable to search by specifying what you don't want instead of specifying what you do.
Prospector lets you make general searches and set up other searches whose items subtract from those results.
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The feature is flexible and Prospector lets you mark any search item as subtractive, and control the extent or scope of the exclusion.
How To Use
Any search item (Page, Group, and any search type - Standard, Captured, Seller search etc.) can be made subtractive.
You just set up the search item as you normally would, and select the "Make this <item> subtractive" option.
Scope Control
You control the extent of the subtraction by making the appropriate item subtractive.
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Description |
Scope |
Description |
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Subtractive page |
Global |
The items found by the subtractive page's groups and searches will be removed from the search results of all non-subtractive pages.
Subtractive pages may be useful for sellers that you'd like to avoid - just create a subtractive page and add seller searches.
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Subtractive group |
Local |
The items found by the subtractive group's searches will be removed from the search results of the non-subtractive groups and searches within the page.
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Subtractive search |
Local |
The items found by the subtractive search will be removed from the search results of the non-subtractive groups and searches within the parent group or page.
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You can have multiple subtractive items sitting at the same level, and their order does not matter, i.e. it doesn't make any difference if you place your subtractive items before or after the non-subtractive items.
Some examples:
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Search Tree |
Notes |
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All results in a subtractive page will be made globally subtractive.
Note: The children of a subtractive item (Grp, A, B, C and D in this example) are automatically subtractive.
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A page with two subtractive groups, Grp 1 and Grp 2.
The results for Grp 3 will be: E + F - A - B - C - D |
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A page with subtractive searches.
The results for Grp will be: A - B - D
The results for C will be: C - D
(D subtracts from Grp and C because they are siblings at the same level). |
Notes
| · | Subtractive pages and groups will still continue to display
their search results just like non-subtractive pages. We're
thinking that there's value in showing what's being used for
exclusion, and you can just ignore these pages and groups if you
like. We'd like to get feedback and possibly add an option to
automatically hide all subtractive results. |
| · | Because subtractive pages and groups continue to display their
results, subtractive searches can be used for partitioning results.
If, for example, you have a search for "Maltese" and a subtractive
search for "Maltese" under the Movies category. You would have
partitioned the results into two groups - the non-movie Maltese
results and the Maltese movie results. |
| · | Global subtracts are currently set to take effect only when an Update All is done. Individual page or search item updates won't use the global subtract list. |