I'm using Examine with a custom data set from an external source, and I'm trying to query a category field to find an exact phrase (which happens to include a stop word.

Below is my Examine configuration

ExamineSettings.config

<Examine>
    <ExamineIndexProviders>
        <providers>
            ...
            <add name="CustomIndexer" 
                type="Examine.LuceneEngine.Providers.SimpleDataIndexer, Examine"
                dataService="Custom.Indexers.CustomDataService, Custom"
                indexTypes="CustomContent" 
                runAsync="true" />
            ...
        </providers>
    </ExamineIndexProviders>
    <ExamineSearchProviders defaultProvider="ExternalSearcher">
        ...
        <add name="CustomSearcher"
            type="Examine.LuceneEngine.Providers.LuceneSearcher, Examine"
            analyzer="Lucene.Net.Analysis.Standard.StandardAnalyzer, Lucene.Net"
            enableLeadingWildcard="true"
            indexSets="CustomIndexSet" />
        ...
    </ExamineSearchProviders>
</Examine>

ExamineIndex.config

<ExamineLuceneIndexSets>
    ...
    <IndexSet SetName="CustomIndexSet" IndexPath="~/App_Data/TEMP/ExamineIndexes/Custom/">
        <IndexUserFields>
            <add Name="id" />
            <add Name="name" />
            <add Name="title" />
            <add Name="url" />
            <add Name="created" />
            <add Name="modified" />
            <add Name="_brand" />
            <add Name="brand" />
            <add Name="_category" />
            <add Name="category" />
        </IndexUserFields>
    </IndexSet>
    ...
</ExamineLuceneIndexSets>

In my ExamineLuceneIndexSet I've created two fields, _category which stores the cateogies as a comma-separated list, and category which stores the categories replacing the comma with a space.

I'm then running a filtered search whereby the user can search by a combination of term (text input), brand (checkbox list: "Mornobit", "Durndrop") and/or category (checkbox list: "Bug and Tar", "Headlights", "Scratch Repair").

Below is the code that I'm currently using.

var term = Request.QueryString["term"];
var brand = Request.QueryString["brand"];
var category = Request.QueryString["category"];

IBooleanOperation filter = null;
var searchProvider = "CustomSearcher";
var searchProviderCollection = ExamineManager.Instance.SearchProviderCollection[searchProvider];
var searchCriteria = searchProviderCollection.CreateSearchCriteria(BooleanOperation.Or);

if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(term))
{
    filter = searchCriteria.GroupedOr(new[] { "name", "title", "keywords", "taxKeyword" }, term.Boost(10.0f));
}

if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(brand))
{
    filter = filter == null
        ? searchCriteria.GroupedOr(new[] { "brand" }, brand.Split(new[] { "," }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries))
        : filter.And().GroupedOr(new[] { "brand" }, brand.Split(new[] { "," }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries));
}

if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(category))
{
    filter = filter == null
        ? searchCriteria.GroupedOr(new[] { "category" }, brand.Split(new[] { "," }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries))
        : filter.And().GroupedOr(new[] { "category" }, brand.Split(new[] { "," }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries));
}

var results = filter == null
    ? searchProviderCollection.Search("*", true)
        .OrderByDescending(x => x.Score)
        .TakeWhile(x => x.Score > minimumScore)
        .ToList()
    : searchProviderCollection
        .Search(filter.Compile())
        .OrderByDescending(x => x.Score)
        .TakeWhile(x => x.Score > minimumScore)
        .ToList();

Using the above code I'm getting the following results using various analyzers

StandardAnalyzer (this removes stop words)

• {{ SearchIndexType: , LuceneQuery: (category:"bug tar") }}
• No results

SimpleAnalyzer

• {{ SearchIndexType: , LuceneQuery: (category:"bug and tar") }}
• No results

WhitespaceAnalyzer

• {{ SearchIndexType: , LuceneQuery: (category:"Bug and Tar") }}
• No results

Ideally when I search for "Bug and Tar", I need to find that exact phrase which I know exists as when querying in the Examine Management dashboard I can see _category:Solutions,Bug and Tar category: Solutions Bug and Tar for some entries.

I'd really appreciate any advice on what I need to do to get this search to work.

UPDATE

After playing around with various settings, I updated my CustomSearcher as follows

<add name="CustomSearcher"
            type="Examine.LuceneEngine.Providers.LuceneSearcher, Examine"
            enableLeadingWildcard="true"
            indexSets="CustomIndexSet" />

Now the search looks like

• {{ SearchIndexType: , LuceneQuery: +(category:"bug ? tar" category:bug category:tar) }}
• Returns results

I still need to do further testing with various filter combinations, but I feel that I have stumbled upon a possible solution.