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Confluence Search Rank Explanation

Davin Studer

I seem to remember seeing somewhere a way to craft a search URL for Confluence that will explain why the results were returned the way that they are. I think it output some JSON showing how the ranking worked out. For the life of me I cannot seem to find the URL again. Anybody know what I am referring to?

Accepted answers

Brant Schroeder

I think that this is what you might be looking for: https://confluence.atlassian.com/confkb/how-do-i-understand-the-ranking-of-confluence-s-search-results-785614686.html

The url that you use on your confluence site is in the first portion of the documentation. http://<your confluence URL>/explain.action?queryString=keywords

All comments

Brant Schroeder

I think that this is what you might be looking for: https://confluence.atlassian.com/confkb/how-do-i-understand-the-ranking-of-confluence-s-search-results-785614686.html

The url that you use on your confluence site is in the first portion of the documentation. http://<your confluence URL>/explain.action?queryString=keywords

Davin Studer

Yes! Awesome. I tried to find it, but I just must not have been searching for the right thing. Thanks a ton sir.

MartiP

This Explain Action URL is super interesting. I noticed, however, it does not include attachments, which are a primary source of unwanted noise in our search results. Does anyone know why it doesn't show rankings for attachments?

I am especially interested in this because the Explain Action URL shows how important the boostByModificationDate component is for pages - but the attachments Confluence returns in the search results are usually quite old.

Please feel free to point me to any other channels/forums where this has been discussed before. Thank you!

Berry Kersten

Hi,

I wondered if the improved searching experience (as presented at Summit 2018) will affect the ranking mechanism.

Will there be new or other elements that influence the score of a document?

Cortlandt _

The Explain Action URL appears to only partially do what the docs say it will do.

Docs say the URL "will provide a formatted list of each search result, and what factors contribute to its overall score."

https://confluence.atlassian.com/confkb/how-do-i-understand-the-ranking-of-confluence-s-search-results-785614686.html

It also seems that ordinary users can't use the URL.