Manage metadata property mappings

Metadata property mappings map properties extracted from documents during crawls (called crawled properties) to managed properties, which users can use in search queries. For example, three different document types might have different names for the property identifying the author. One document type might name this property "author," another "writer," and a third "property3." You can map each of these crawled properties to the Author managed property so that when a user queries by author, appropriate results from the three document types are included. Searches can be performed only on managed properties, not crawled properties.

To manage metadata property mappings, you must first open the Metadata Property Mappings page. To open the Metadata Property Mappings page:

1. On the Quick Launch, click Application Management.

2. On the Application Management page, under Service Applications, click Manage service applications.

3. On the Manage Service Applications page, in the list of service applications, click the search service application that you want to configure or click anywhere in the row of the search service application that you want to configure, and then click Manage on the ribbon.

4. On the SearchServiceApplicationName: Search Administration page, on the Quick Launch, under Queries and Results, click Metadata properties.

What do you want to do?

Add a managed property

Edit a managed property

Delete a managed property

Edit a category

Delete a category

Add a managed property

1. On the Metadata Property Mappings page, click New Managed Property.

2. On the New Managed Property page, in the Name and type section, in the Property name box, type the name of the new managed property.

   1. In the Description box, type a detailed description of the property.

   2. Under The type of information in this property, select one of the following options as the type of data for this property:

      • Text

      • Integer

      • Decimal

      • Date and Time

      • Yes/No

   3. Select the Has Multiple Values check box to enable you to select more than one type of data.

3. In the Mappings to crawled properties section, select one of the following options:

   1. Include values from all crawled properties mapped.     Select this option if you want values from all crawled properties to be mapped for a given document. A query for a property in a document in which all crawled properties are mapped returns a result if any of the crawled properties that are mapped match.

   2. Include values from a single crawled property based on the order specified.     Select this option if you want only a single value mapped. When multiple crawled properties are mapped to a managed property, the first value in Crawled properties mapped to this managed property is chosen for a document.

   3. You can reorder the list by selecting a value and then clicking the Move up and Move down buttons.

   4. To add a mapping to the list, click Add Mapping.

   5. • In the Crawled property selection dialog box, expand the Select a category menu, and then select either All categories or a specific type of document category (for example, Office or XML).

      • In the Select a crawled property list, select a crawled property to map to the managed property that you are adding.

      • Because the list of crawled properties is likely to be long, you can type the name (or the first part of the name) of the property that you are looking for in the Crawled property name box, and then click Find.

      • Click OK.

4. On the New Managed Property page, in the Use in scopes section, select the Allow this property to be used in scopes check box if you want the property to be available for defining search scopes.

   Tip: Select this check box only for those properties that you intend to use in scopes. Each property that is set as a scope increases the size of the index, which should be avoided when possible.

5. In the Optimize managed property storage section, select the Reduce storage requirements for text properties by using a hash for comparison check box if you want to lower the amount of storage needed for metadata properties.

   Select the Add managed property to custom results set retrieved on each query. Note: Only the first 2 kilobytes data is available for display by default check box if you are using a customized results page and you want to display managed properties on this results page.

6. Click OK. In the message box advising that the changes will not take effect until after the next full crawl, click OK.

   Note: Changes to the property mappings take effect on a document-by-document basis as soon as a document is crawled, regardless of the type of the crawl. A full crawl ensures that the changes are consistently applied to the entire index.

Top of Page

Edit a managed property

You may want to edit a managed property to map an additional crawled property to it.

To edit a managed property:

1. On the Metadata Property Mappings page, in the Managed Properties View list, point to the managed property that you want to edit, expand the menu, and then click Edit/Map Property.

2. On the Edit Managed Property - PropertyName page, configure the settings that you want to change.

   For more information about managed property settings, see the Add a managed property section of this topic.

Top of Page

Delete a managed property

Deleting a managed property has the following consequences:

• Users will no longer be able to query by using this property.

• If a scope uses this property in its rules, the scope will not work.

• If custom search applications or Web Parts use this property, they will not work.

To delete a managed property:

1. On the Metadata Property Mappings page, in the Managed Properties View list, point to the managed property that you want to delete, expand the menu, and then click Delete.

2. Click OK to confirm the deletion.

Top of Page

Edit a category

To edit a category:

1. On the Metadata Property Mappings page, click Crawled Properties.

2. In the Crawled Properties View list, point to the category that you want to edit, expand the menu, and then click Edit Category.

3. On the Edit Category: CategoryName page, in the Name and Information section, you can type a new name for the category or leave the current name.

4. In the Bulk Crawled Property Settings section, select one or more of the following check boxes:

   • Automatically discover new properties when a crawl takes place

   • Map all string properties in this category to the Content managed property

   • Automatically generate a new managed property for each crawled property discovered in this category

   • Delete all unmapped crawled properties

Top of Page

Delete a category

To delete a category:

1. On the Metadata Property Mappings page, click Crawled Properties.

2. In the Crawled Properties View list, point to the category that you want to delete, expand the menu, and then click Delete.

3. Click OK to confirm the deletion.

For the most current and comprehensive content related to this product, see http://technet.microsoft.com.

Top of Page