ElasticSearch: Faceted Search for Hierarchical data

Faceted Search is the navigational search allowing business to clearly define the properties or characteristics of the product catalog and navigate user to find relevant products with minimum efforts. Most of the available search solutions support the functionality now a days, in this post we will cover how to implemented faceted search using flattened data approach for hierarchical data using ElasticSearch for a typical eCommerce platform.

Search Scenarios/Business Example:

Earlier post, Data Modeling approach for search content and tagging  explains the different characteristics of a typical eCommerce platform serving hierarchical data in terms of categorization of data and sub categorization.

Take an example of such a typical eCommerce platform where one site you need to display the Navigration browsing of your hierarchical data based on some search solution. For example, you need to display products like Books/Clothes etc. Each product has its own specific characteristics and can be categoriezed in different categories and sub categories.

Hierarchical Data:

The hierarchical data in business form represents the taxonomy for your data. The way you can characterize your data in the form of different category type, categories and sub categories for the product catalog.