Presented at SharePoint TechFest Dallas 2015. All rights reserved.

1. KQL AND THE CONTENT
SEARCH WEB PART (CSWP)
IT Pro Solutions leveraging SharePoint 2013
search abilities (and KQL,REST and jQuery).

2. ABOUT ME: PAUL MCCOLLUM
SharePoint Platform Manager at 7-Eleven Inc.
MCITP SharePoint 2010, MCTS SQL Server, SP 2007,WSS
@SharePointShark (www.sharepointyesNO.net)
Programming since 1978
Technology Evangelist/Forecaster
www.everythingUSB.com
www.ohGizmo.com
Solution Architect
JavaScript sub-guru
Intranet Platform Manager/Governance/Solution Architecture
{paul_mccollum}AT{Hotmail}

3. LEANING INTO A NEW ERA
 Content Creation Explosion
 The ease of SharePoint turned many people and businesses into
content publishing machines.
 And in many cases the machines turned into monsters.
 People didn’t understand Content Governance.
 Search is similar.
 Due to the technology of the time:
 Content loading was slow
 Search was SLOWER and resource intensive.
 No need for concepts like tagging or SEO.

4. BUT…
 We still handle search with tongs like we are worried it's going to
break again.
 There's usually ONLY:
 A search page.
 A search box.
I’m so
lonely.

5. WHY AREN’T WE LEVERAGING
SEARCH MORE?
 Since search data is cached well, the heavy lifting is done by the
crawl.
 Search queries can actually be more performant than those from
native data.
 This gives us a reason to take a second look at content we
surface and see if it could be improved with search data.
 With FAST Search in SharePoint we can now look at Search as a
Primary Data Source

6. CONTENT SEARCH WEB PART
 The Content Search Web Part is one of the easiest ways to start
“turning the corner” to grab and correlate data to provide more
useful information to the user.
 With CSWP you can very easily coalesce topic based information
and not be as worried about the source or physical location of
the data.
 Currently working in o365 (November 2013)

7. CSWP, KQL AND DISPLAY TEMPLATES
 Now that we see a little bit of the technology change, we can start
to look at making use of it to power mini-applications.
 Content Search Web Part
 Simple and Wizard driven.
 KQL
 A pseudo-language and syntax to refine search queries beyond the Wizard.
 No more CAML
 Display Templates
 HTML formatting, no XSLT
 Can be extended with JavaScript and jQuery.
 REST Connectors
 Use as a raw data source for apps
 No more CAML

8. OUT OF THE BOX,
IT LEAVES A LOT TO BE DESIRED.

9. HOWEVER, THE QUERY WIZARD IS
PRETTY AWESOME

10. CSWP : EXAMPLES
 Demo: Create CSWPs

11. CSWP : EXAMPLES

12. CSWP : VS. WMS
 WMS (Work Management Service)
 Limited
 Fast
 Tied to User Profile, Search and WMS Services
 CSWP
 Flexible
 Predictable
 Only dependent on Search Service

13. KQL
 KQL: The language of Search
 2 types
 Keyword
 Generic word search
 Word or Words
 "a phrase“
 * wildcard: works for words but only for the end of phrases
 Property Filter
 Targeted and Refined for specific columns or metadata

14. KQL
 Property Filtering (syntax)
 Author equals “John Smith”
 <Property Name> <Property Operator> <Property Value>
 author:"John Smith"
 secondaryfiletype:docx
 filename:budget.xlsx
 Property Names must be Managed Fields in SharePoint
 Unmanaged fields must be registered to show up in Search (Huge list available by
default)
 Property Operators
 (numeric, int, DateTime) : = < > <= >= <> ..
 (string/bool) : =
 Other Operators
 UNION AND (+) OR NOT (-) NEAR ONEAR

15. KQL
 Variables (from requestor context)
 {Site.URL}
 {Site.<property>}
 {Page.URL}
 {URLToken.<integer>}
 {User.Name}
 {User.Email}
 {User.<property>}
 Many more…. https://technet.microsoft.com/en-
us/library/jj683123.aspx

16. KQL
 Attributes (from result set)
 https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj219630.aspx

17. KQL
 Demo of KQL and config of CSWP
 THEN *Audience Participation*

18. EXAMPLES
 Is my stuff getting old?
 Author={User.Name}
LastModifiedTime<{Today-65}
 What have I been working on this week?
 Author={User.Name}
LastModifiedTime>{Today-5}
 My ears are burning. Who’s talking about me?
 Author<>{User.Name}
AND
( {User.LastName} OR {User.Email} )
 Who’s messing with my Stuff?
 Author={User.Name}
ModifiedBy<>{User.Name}
 Manage My Content
 These files are too big.
 Size>30000000
 These files should only be on certain sites.
 (SecondaryFileExtension=wmv OR
SecondaryFileExtension=avi OR
SecondaryFileExtension=mpg OR
SecondaryFileExtension=asf OR
SecondaryFileExtension=mp4 OR
SecondaryFileExtension=ogg OR
SecondaryFileExtension=ogv OR
SecondaryFileExtension=webm)
 These words really shouldn’t be on the site.
 “Damn” “heck” “chick” “credit card” “SSN”
 What’s new in HR this week?
 path:"http://SITE/HR/"
(IsDocument:"True" OR
Contentclass:"STS_ListItem")
LastModifiedTime>{Today-5}
 Governance

19. EXAMPLES: BONUS ROUND
 (
 SecondaryFileExtension=jpg
 OR SecondaryFileExtension=gif
 OR SecondaryFileExtension=bmp
 OR SecondaryFileExtension=png
 OR SecondaryFileExtension=tiff
 OR SecondaryFileExtension=raw
 )
 “Mud” “soil” “earth”

20. USEFUL ALONE OR IN GROUPS

21. DISPLAY TEMPLATES : MECHANICS
Display Templates are very similar to the
CQWP XSLT templates.
An Outer Template calls a looping Inner
Template.
No longer XML and XSLT
HTML and JavaScript with ‘Server Side’
Substitution

22. DISPLAY TEMPLATES : MECHANICS
To Access Display Template
• Map Network Drive
• Don’t need Designer

23. DISPLAY TEMPLATES : CODE
Result Variable Column Mapping

24. DISPLAY TEMPLATES : CODE
Variable Assignment
Display HTML

25. DISPLAY TEMPLATES : EXAMPLES
Demo of Display Template alterations

26. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
HTML vs .Net
Document Library
Versioning
No Compilation
Content Editor Web Part
Script Web Part
Cloud Friendly

27. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
REST, HTML and jQuery
More Power
More Flexibility
Fewer Hoops

28. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
 Learning REST
 POST or GET
 Chrome’s Dev HTTP Client
 Fiddler

29. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
jQuery
Ajax
JSON
.each()

30. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
Places to get ideas
DynamicDrive.com
JavascriptKit.com
Smashingapps.com

31. THE REST: WITH REST AND JQUERY
Steps
Create query URL (REST)
Load into Array
Convert to HTML structure (if needed)
Wire-up to flashy plugin

32. JQUERY APPS : EXAMPLES
 Demo: Create REST Search mini App

33. RESOURCES
 KQL
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/sharepoint/ee558911.aspx
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj163973.aspx
 Search Variables
 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj683123.aspx
 Default Crawled Properties
 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj219630.aspx
 Display Template Reference
 http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj944947.aspx
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj945138.aspx
 Codeplex sharepoint query tool.
 REST Endpoints
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/office/apps/jj860569.aspx
 REST Programming
 http://www.plusconsulting.com/blog/2013/05/crud-on-list-items-using-rest-services-jquery/
 SharePoint Search REST API overview (http://server/_api/search/query?querytext='sharepoint')
 http://msdn.microsoft.com/EN-US/library/sharepoint/jj163876.aspx
 Working with Result data from REST calls
 http://sharepointfieldnotes.blogspot.com/2013/01/sharepoint-2013-search-with-rest-app.html
 Image Rotator
 http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamicindex14/shockwave/index.htm