Definitions & Concepts
If you are going to build a search engine you need to know a few terms.
Microservice — Service that allows code that run in the cloud. In this project, the small piece of code runs on Heroku.com and provides the bridge between Takeshape and Algolia.
API — Application Programming Interface. Long name for a simple concept. Its a way to allow programs and services to take to each other. (Its also how Skynet will get control.)
API Keys- Private ID values that provide an individual user or program acess to an API. Think of API keys as a digital version of your front apartment or house keys. You tend to keep them secure.
Git — Program to allow you to manage your git repo.
JSON — Javascript Object Notation
WebHooks — Feature of a site or service that allows changes in data to be pushed to other applications for action. Commonly used to alert other systems of changes or actions.
Algolia Terms
Index — Algolia object contains all the data, configuration and settings for your search engine.
Facet — A field in an index that allows users to do more complex queries.
Disjunctive Facet — A field in an index that allows
Filter — Feature of an index that allows for limiting the total recoreds in a query.
searchable — Setting in an index that determines if a given facet can have its values searchable from a query or search UI.
Faceted Search UI — UI that contains facets, query terms, results, and pagination.
AutoComplete UI — A single line search element that provides matching results as a user types in values. Here is an example that lets a user enter a part of cheese name and see results as they type.
GeoSearch — Type of Algolia search that uses geographic locations to enable search by location. And enables the display of search results in a map format.
Ranking — Set of rules or concepts that allow a user to return the best matches for a given query term or set of refinements.
