Search Engine

Integration with Coveo involves using the Headless library, which allows developers to utilize the native Coveo library for creating customized search experiences.

The factory producing search engine configuration is stored in the engine/engine-config.ts file. This file is used to initialize the search engine configuration. It is shared across the server-side rendering (SSR) and client engines.

Please, check the Coveo Headless documentation for more information about the library and its capabilities.

Request Preprocessor

All options are defined arbitrarily and can be adjusted to fit your specific needs. However, there is a specific withAlokai function that is necessary for the integration to work properly. It allows you to benefit from the middleware layer provided by the Alokai architecture.

This function routes the request to the middleware layer, where the request is processed and then sent to the Coveo API. The middleware layer normalizes the request and response data and handles communication with the Coveo API.

In most cases, you will not need to modify any parameters in the withAlokai function. However, you can do so if necessary. One common example is the whitelistedMethods parameter, which defines the methods that will be routed to the middleware layer. By default, the withAlokai function is set to handle the querySuggest, search, and productRecommendations methods, as these methods are expected to work with potentially heavy data that should be handled by the middleware layer. On the other hand, all analytics methods are not handled by the middleware layer and are sent directly to the Coveo API.

Define facets

Headless library comes with defineFacets method that allows you to define facets for the search interface. However, this have a drawback that you need to define each facet manually, remember their names and use these keys in the code later. To overcome this, our facetManager has a method defineFacets that allows you to register all facets at once based on a single configuration file. This way, we use the same configuration in all places and we don't need to remember facet names or how to use them. We do it for you!

If you want to learn more about configuring facets, please check the Facet Configuration section.