Understand search interface

Familiarize yourself with the search interface and the available actions.

Understand Experience Manager Assets search results interface

Figure: Understand Experience Manager Assets search results interface.

A. Save search as a smart collection. B. Filters or predicates to narrow the search results. C. Display files, folders, or both. D. Click Filters to open or close the left rail. E. Search location is DAM. F. Omnisearch field with user-provided search keyword. G. Select the loaded search results. H. Number of displayed search results out of the total search results. I. Close search. J. Switch between card view and list view.

Dynamic search facets

You can discover the desired assets faster from the search results page using the dynamically updated number of expected search results in the search facets. The expected number of assets are updated even before applying the search filter. Seeing the expected count against the filter helps you navigate through the search results quickly and efficiently.

See the approximate number of assets without filtering search results in search facets.

Figure: See the approximate number of assets without filtering search results in search facets.

Understand search results and behavior

Basic search terms and results

You can run keyword searches from the OmniSearch field. The keyword search is not case-sensitive and is a full-text search (across the popular metadata fields). If more than one keyword is used, AND is the default operator between the keywords.

The results are sorted by relevance, starting with closest matches. For multiple keywords, more relevant results are the assets that contain both terms in their metadata. Within metadata, keywords appearing as smart tags are higher ranked than keywords appearing in other metadata fields. Experience Manager allows giving a particular search term higher weight. Also, it is possible to boost the rank of a few targeted assets for specific search terms.

To quickly find the relevant assets, the rich interface provides filtering, sorting, and selection mechanisms. You can filter results based on multiple criteria and see number of searched assets for various filters. Alternatively, you can rerun search by changing the query in the Omnisearch field. When you change your search terms or filters, the other filters remain applied to preserve your search’s context.

When the results are many assets, Experience Manager displays the first 100 in the card view and 200 in the list view. As users scroll, more assets are loaded. This is to improve the performance. Watch a video demonstration of the number of assets displayed.

At times, you may see some unexpected assets in the search results. For more info, see unexpected results.

Experience Manager can search many file formats and the search filters can be customized to suit your business requirements. Contact your administrator to understand what search options are made available for your DAM repository and what restrictions your account has.

Results with and without enhanced Smart Tags

By default, Experience Manager search combines the search terms with an AND clause. For example, consider searching for keywords woman running. Only the assets with both woman and running keywords in the metadata appear in the search results by default. The same behavior is retained when special characters (periods, underscores, or dashes) are used with the keywords. The following search queries return the same results:

  • woman running
  • woman.running
  • woman-running

However, the query woman -running returns assets without running in their metadata.
Using Smart Tags adds an extra OR clause to find any of the search terms as the applied smart tags. An asset tagged with either woman or running using Smart Tags also appear in such a search query. So the search results are a combination of,

  • Assets with woman and running keywords in the metadata (default behavior).

  • Assets smart tagged with either of the keywords (Smart Tags behavior).

Search suggestions as you type

When you start typing keywords, Experience Manager suggests the possible search keywords or phrases. The suggestions are based on the metadata of the existing assets. Experience Manager indexes all the metadata fields to help with search. To provide search suggestions, the system uses the values of the following few metadata fields. To provide search suggestions, consider populating the following fields with appropriate keywords:

  • Asset tags. (maps to jcr:content/metadata/cq:tags)
  • Asset title. (maps to jcr:content/metadata/dc:title)
  • Asset description. (maps to jcr:content/metadata/dc:description)
  • Title in the JCR repository. The value may get mapped to Asset title. (maps to jcr:content/jcr:title)
  • Description in the JCR repository. The value may get mapped to Asset description. (maps to jcr:content/jcr:description)

To receive suggestions for more than one search keywords, continue to type all keywords without selecting any suggestion for a single keyword.

Type multiple keywords to view suggestions that fit them all

Figure: Type multiple keywords to view suggestions that fit them all.

Search ranking and boosting

The search results that match all search terms in metadata fields are displayed first, followed by the search results that match any of the search terms in the smart tags. In the above example, the approximate order of display of search results is:

  1. Matches of woman running in the various metadata fields.
  2. Matches of woman running in smart tags.
  3. Matches of woman or of running in smart tags.

You can improve the relevance of keywords for particular assets to help boost searches based on the keywords. In other words, the images for which you promote specific keywords appear at the top of the search results when you search based on these keywords.

  1. From the Assets user interface, open the properties page for the asset. Click Advanced and click Add under Elevate for search keywords.
  2. In the Search Promote box, specify a keyword for which you want to boost the search for the image and then click Add. You can specify multiple keywords in the same way.
  3. Click Save & Close. The asset which you promoted for this keyword appears among the top search results.

You can use this to your advantage by boosting the rank of some assets in the search results for the targeted keyword. See the example video below. For detailed info, see search in Experience Manager.

Video: Understand how search results are ranked and how the rank can be influenced.

Advanced search

Experience Manager provides various methods like filters that apply to the searched assets, to help you locate the desired assets faster. A few commonly used methods are described below. Some illustrated examples are shared below.

Search for files or folders: In the search results, see either files, folders, or both. From Filters panel, you can select the appropriate option. See search interface.

Search for assets within a folder: You can limit the search to a specific folder. In the Filters panel, add path of a folder. You can select only one folder at a time.

Limit search results to a folder by adding a folder path in Filters panel

Figure: Limit search results to a folder by adding a folder path in Filters panel.

Find similar images

To find images that are visually similar to a user-selected image, click Find Similar option from the card view of an image or from the toolbar. Experience Manager displays the smart tagged images from the DAM repository that are similar to a user-selected image. See how to configure similarity search.

Find similar images using the option in the card view

Figure: Find similar images using the option in the card view.

Adobe Stock images

From within the Experience Manager user interface, users can search Adobe Stock assets and license the required assets. Add Location: Adobe Stock in the Omnisearch bar. You can also use Filters panel to find all the licensed or unlicensed assets or search a specific asset using Adobe Stock file number.

Dynamic Media assets

You can filter for Dynamic Media images by selecting Dynamic Media > Sets from the Filters panel. It filters and displays assets such as image sets, carousels, mixed media sets, and spin sets.

You can search digital assets based on exact values of metadata fields, such as, title, description, and creator. The GQL full-text search feature fetches only those assets whose metadata value exactly matches your search query. The names of the properties (Creator, Title, and so on) and the values are case-sensitive.

Metadata fieldFacet value and usage
Titletitle:John
Creatorcreator:John
Locationlocation:NA
Descriptiondescription:“Sample Image”
Creator toolcreatortool:“Adobe Photoshop”
Copyright Ownercopyrightowner:“Adobe Systems”
Contributorcontributor:John
Usage Termsusageterms:“CopyRights Reserved”
Createdcreated:YYYY-MM-DDTHH
Expires Dateexpires:YYYY-MM-DDTHH
On timeontime:YYYY-MM-DDTHH
Off timeofftime:YYYY-MM-DDTHH
Range of time(expires dateontime,offtime)facet field : lowerbound…upperbound
Path/content/dam/<folder name>
PDF Titlepdftitle:“Adobe Document”
Subjectsubject:“Training”
Tagstags:“Location And Travel”
Typetype:“image\png”
Width of imagewidth:lowerbound…upperbound
Height of imageheight:lowerbound…upperbound
Personperson:John

The properties path, limit, size, and orderby cannot be combined using OR operator with any other property.

The keyword for a user-generated property is its field label in the property editor in lowercase, with spaces removed.

Here are some examples of search formats for complex queries:

  • To display all assets with multiple facets fields (for example: title=John Doe and creator tool = Adobe Photoshop): title:"John Doe" creatortool:Adobe*
  • To display all assets when the facets value is not a single word but a sentence (for example: title=Scott Reynolds): title:"Scott Reynolds"
  • To display assets with multiple values of a single property (for example: title=Scott Reynolds or John Doe): title:"Scott Reynolds" OR "John Doe"
  • To display assets with property values starting with a specific string (for example: title is Scott Reynolds): title:Scott*
  • To display assets with property values ending with a specific string (for example: title is Scott Reynolds): title:*Reynolds
  • To display assets with a property value that contains a specific string (for example: title = Basel Meeting Room): title:*Meeting*
  • To display assets that contain a particular string and have a specific property value (for example: search for string Adobe in assets having title=John Doe): *Adobe* title:"John Doe"

Search digital assets from other Experience Manager offerings or interfaces

Adobe Experience Manager connects DAM repository to various other Experience Manager solutions to provide faster access to digital assets and streamline the creative workflows. Any asset discovery starts with browse or search. The search behavior largely remains the same across the various surfaces and solutions. Some search methods change as the target audience, the use cases, and the user interface vary across the Experience Manager solutions. The specific methods are documented for the individual solutions at the links below. The universally applicable tips and behaviors are documented in this article.

Search digital assets from Adobe Asset Link panel

Using Adobe Asset Link, the creative professionals can now access content stored in Experience Manager Assets, without leaving the supported Adobe Creative Cloud apps. Creatives can seamlessly browse, search, check out, and check in assets using the in-app panel in the Adobe Creative Cloud apps: Adobe Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator, and Adobe InDesign. Asset Link also allows users to search visually similar results. The visual search display results are powered by Adobe Sensei’s machine learning algorithms and help users find aesthetically similar images. See search and browse assets using Adobe Asset Link.

Search digital assets in Experience Manager desktop app

Creative professionals use the desktop app to make the Experience Manager Assets easily searchable and available on their local desktop (Win or Mac). Creatives can easily reveal the desired assets in Mac Finder or Windows Explorer, opened in desktop applications, and changed locally - the changes are saved back to Experience Manager with a new version created in the repository. The application supports basic searches using one or more keywords, * and ? wildcards, and AND operator. See browse, search, and preview assets in desktop app.

Search digital assets in Brand Portal

Line-of-business users and marketers use Brand Portal to efficiently and securely share the approved digital assets with their extended internal teams, partners, and resellers. See search assets on Brand Portal.

Search Adobe Stock images

From within the Experience Manager user interface, users can search Adobe Stock assets and license the required assets. Add Location: Adobe Stock in the Omnisearch field. You can also use Filters panel to find all the licensed or unlicensed assets or search a specific asset using Adobe Stock file number. See manage Adobe Stock images in Experience Manager.

Search Dynamic Media assets

You can filter for Dynamic Media images by selecting Dynamic Media > Sets from the Filters panel. It filters and displays assets such as image sets, carousels, mixed media sets, and spin sets. While authoring web pages, the authors can search for sets from within the Content Finder. A filter for sets is available in a pop-up menu.