Sun Microsystems Netscape Enterprise Server, Administrator'S Manual

Page: 435 / 532

Chapter 16, Using Search 435
Customizing the Search Interface
HTML Pattern Files
A good place to begin customizing the interface is by modifying the existing
pattern files. After you see how they work and you understand pattern
variables, you can create your own pattern files and change the configuration
files and other pattern files to point to them. In the default installation of
Netscape Enterprise Server, the pattern files are in this directory:
server_root
\plugins\search\ui\text
. (Make copies of your original
pattern files so you can restore them afterwards.)
There are pattern files for different kinds of collections: email, news, ASCII,
PDF, and HTML as well as one for the web publishing collection. (The web
publishing pattern file is a special case, using a great many collection-specific
attributes as variables in the
dblist.ini
file.) There are several general types
of pattern files, each of which has a particular use:
•
query.pat
displays the standard and advanced query pages.
•
tocstart.pat
displays the header across the top of the search results
page.
•
tocrec.pat
displays each document listed on the search results page.
•
tocend.pat
displays the footer across the bottom of the search results
page.
•
record.pat
displays a single highlighted document from the search
results page (for more information, see “Displaying a Highlighted
Document” on page 423).
•
descriptions.pat
displays the collection contents.
The pattern files contain HTML formatting instructions, which define how
elements look, and HTML search arguments and variables, which define the
text label or value that is displayed.
There are three kinds of pattern variables (discussed further in “Using Pattern
Variables” on page 439):
• user defined, in the
userdefs.ini
file, with a
$$
prefix (see “User-
defined Pattern Variables” on page 440).