Using search in Cortex

Searching your data in Cortex

Cortex has two options for searching across your data:

• The search bar at the top of any catalog

  • Click the magnifying glass in the upper right corner of a list to open the search bar.

    
  • This search uses Lucene for the search index. See the available operators below.

• The global search at the top of the main nav

  • The global search allows you to conduct a quick search from anywhere in Cortex, and it searches across names, descriptions, and tags.

Using the catalog search bar

When you need to find a specific entity in Cortex, use the search bar at the top of any catalog:

1. Click the magnifying glass in the upper right corner.

   
2. Enter text into the search bar.

   • You can use plain text for a basic search, or use operators to refine your search.

Searches prepend and append a wildcard to your search. For example, searching for "search doc" would be translated into *search doc* under the hood.

Search index and operators

Cortex uses Lucene for the search index, so queries must follow Lucene syntax.

If you search for a term that includes Lucene syntax characters, such as :, try wrapping your search term in double quotes.

Below is a chart of Cortex's search index and available operators. The search fields are listed in order of weight, with title, tag and CID carrying the most weight and repo basepath, links, and custom data carrying the least weight.

Search field	Corresponding YAML field	Explanation	Examples (based on sample YAMLs below)
Title (title: or name:)	title	Searches for the entity's name as defined in the title field.	search doc search title:"search doc" name:"search doc"
Tag (tag:)	x-cortex-tag	Searches for an entity tag as defined in the x-cortex-tag field. If an entity tag has more than one term separated by a hyphen, you can search for the tag using hyphens or spaces. At least one of these (or a wildcard) must be used for results to be generated.	search-doc search tag:"search-doc" tag:"search"
CID (cid:)	(depends on integration)	Searches for an ID associated with an entity. This usually comes from a third-party integration.	ASDF1234 cid:"ASDF1234"
Description (description:)	description	Searches for the supplied term(s) in an entity's description.	example entity article search example description:"article" description:"using search"
Group (group:)	x-cortex-groups	Searches for entity group names.	docs writing group:"writing-project" group:"docs"
Owner (owner:)	x-cortex-owners	Searches for the owner(s) of an entity. If the owner is a team, Cortex searches team names and team members' names and email addresses. If the owner is an individual, Cortex searches for the user email.	technical writers sample.user owner:"sample" owner:"technical"
Member (member:)	x-cortex-team, members	Searches for the name and email address for a team member. This query only returns Team entities.	additional user additional.user member:"additional" member:"user"
Slack channel (slack:)	x-cortex-slack	Searches for a Slack channel name defined in the x-cortex-slack field.	frontal-lobe left-brain slack:"frontal" slack:"left"
Microsoft Teams channel (microsoft-team:)	x-cortex-microsoft-teams	Searches for a Microsoft Teams channel name defined in the x-cortex-microsoft-teams field.	team-docs documentation microsoft-team:"team-docs" microsoft-team:"documentation"
Repository (repo: or repository:)	x-cortex-git, repository	Searches for a Git repository name.	cortex/docs docs repo:"docs" repo:"cortex/docs"
Repo basepath (repo-basepath: or repository-basepath: )	x-cortex-git, basepath	Searches for a Git repo basepath name.	myEntity repo-basepath:"myEntity"
Link (link:)	x-cortex-link	Searches for link based on name and URL defined under x-cortex-link.	docs.cortex.io live docs link:"live" link:"docs.cortex"
Custom data (key:value)	x-cortex-custom-metadata	Searches for custom data imported from APIs, third-party integrations, and/or defined in the x-cortex-metadata block.	regions-of-brain:cerebrum The key is case-sensitive.
AWS account ID (aws-account-id:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for the AWS account ID of an entity.	aws-account-id:"012345678901"
AWS account name (aws-account-name:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for entities with an AWS account name.	aws-account-name:"example-aws-account"
AWS region (aws-region:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for entities in an AWS region.	aws-region:"us-west-1"
AWS ARN (aws-arn:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for an Amazon Resource Name (ARN).	aws-arn:"arn:aws:iam::123456789012:user/johndoe"
AWS entity type (aws-type:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for entities of a given AWS entity type.	aws-type:"lambda"
AWS entity name (aws-name:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for an AWS entity name.	aws-name:"abc-lambda"
AWS primary identifier (aws-identifier:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for an AWS primary identifier.	aws-identifier: "value"
AWS secondary identifier (aws-secondary-identifier:)	Defined in AWS, not in an entity's YAML	Searches for an AWS secondary identifier.	aws-secondary-identifier: "value"

Example YAML files

The YAML files below show what an entity might look like based on the examples in the table above:

Search doc entity YAML

info:
  title: Search doc
  description: Example entity for an article about using search in Cortex.
  x-cortex-tag: search-doc
  x-cortex-type: service
  x-cortex-groups:
    - writing-project
    - docs
  x-cortex-git:
    github:
      repository: cortex/docs
      basepath: myEntity
  x-cortex-link:
    - url: https://docs.cortex.io/
      name: Live docs
      type: DOCUMENTATION
  x-cortex-owners:
    - name: technical-writers
      type: GROUP
      provider: CORTEX
    - type: EMAIL
      email: [e-mail]
  x-cortex-oncall:
    pagerduty:
      id: ASDF1234
      type: SERVICE
  x-cortex-slack:
    channels:
      - name: frontal-lobe
        notificationsEnabled: true
      - name: left-brain
        notificationsEnabled: true
  x-cortex-microsoft-teams:
    channels:
    - name: team-docs
      teamName: documentation
      description: This is a description for the docs channel in Teams.
      notificationsEnabled: true
  x-cortex-metadata:
    regions-of-brain: cerebrum, cerebellum

Technical writers team YAML

info:
  title: Technical writers
  description: Example Team behind the article about using search in Cortex.
  x-cortex-type: team
  x-cortex-tag: technical-writers
  x-cortex-team: 
    groups:
      - name: cortex/technical-writers
        provider: GITHUB
    members:
      - name: Additional User
        email: [e-mail]
        notificationsEnabled: true

An entity's title, tag, and ID have carry the greatest weight in a search.

Search AWS details

There are additional keys available to search Amazon Web Services (AWS) details in Cortex. See Searching AWS entities in Cortex for more information.

Using global search in Cortex

You can search the Cortex platform from any page using the global search function. Global search pulls from names, descriptions, and tags.

Click Search in the upper left side of Cortex, and a search modal will appear:

You can search across all items, or you can click into tabs to view entities, Initiatives, catalogs, plugins, Scorecards, Workflows, or CQL reports. Click into any item in the search results to navigate to it.

The first 10 results are displayed in the modal. Click See all to view additional results.