Searching multiple fields with Lucene

Question

I'm having some trouble with a search I'm trying to implement. I need for a user to be able to enter a search query into a web interface and for the back-end Java to search for the query in a number of fields. An example of this might be best:

Say I have a List containing "Person" objects. Say each object holds two String fields about the person:

FirstName:  Jack
Surname:    Smith

FirstName   Mary
Surname:    Jackson

If a user enters, "jack", I need the search to match both objects, the first on Surname, and the second on FirstName.

I've been looking at using a MultiFieldQueryParser but can't get the fields set up right. Any help on this or pointing to a good tutorial would be greatly appreciated.

Adrian Smith Adrian Smith · Accepted Answer · 2011-04-06T13:53:51

MultiFieldQueryParser is what you want, as you say.

Make sure:

The field names are always used consistently
The same Analyzer is used on both fields, and also on the query parser
You won't find partial words by default, so if you search for jack you won't find jackson. (You can search for jack* in that case.)

Regarding field name, I always set up an enum for my field names, then use e.g. MyFieldEnum.firstname.name() when passing field names to Lucene, so that if I make a spelling mistake the compiler can catch it, and it's also a good place to put Javadoc so you can see what the fields are for, and also a place where you can see the complete list of fields you wish to support in your Lucene documents.

Searching multiple fields with Lucene

1 Answers