View and Manage Project Metadata Search Fields for Include Metadata

Home > selected Project > menu or right-click > Settings > Metadata Search Fields
Project > Settings drop-down > Project Settings > Metadata Search Fields

Requires Project - Metadata Search Fields - View, Add/Edit Permissions

For all query-based eDiscovery searches, the Include Metadata option expands the search of each keyword in a query to include set of metadata fields as well as content. When this option is enabled, all individual keywords as well as the keywords in phrases, and in special searches such as Proximity Search, are subject to expansion.

Use the Project Metadata Search Fields to customize the list of metadata fields searched for the Project. Your administrator can also specify the Search Fields in a Search Settings template at the Organization or System level.

The following actions apply to the Project Search Fields:

  • View a list of the applied Search Fields.
  • If you have the appropriate permissions, you can add fields to the Project Search Fields list and remove fields from the list.

Available Fields Information and Actions

The Available Fields list contains the fields that have not yet been assigned to the Metadata Search Fields.

  • Field Name – The name of an available metadata field that has not yet been assigned to the Metadata Search Fields list. See The Metadata List for descriptions of these fields. Note that the Metadata Search Fields list does not include any Analytic Metadata Fields such as dateprimary or custodian_view.
  • Filter text box – You can use the Filter text box under the Field Name column on the Available Fields list to filter by field name. (The icon indicates that filtering is available.) Using the Filter box enables you to pinpoint the items you want to work with based on a Filter term search containing one or more characters you enter. You can explicitly apply a filter by typing one or more characters in the text box and clicking Enter (the return key). If you type one or more characters in the text box, the software will automatically apply the filter for you, and the text box changes to a yellow background color. For any applied filter, you can then clear the filter by removing the text in the box and clicking Enter, by removing the text from the box, or by clicking the that appears at the far right of the Filter box. Clearing a filter restores the list to its original state.
  • Description – A description of an available metadata field. Hover over the description to see the entire description.

Use the appropriate checkboxes to select one or more or all fields to add to the Metadata Search Fields list, as follows:

  • (top-level field checkbox) — Use the checkbox that appears at the top of the list of fields to select all fields. To clear the selection of all fields in the list, clear the top checkbox.If you select one or more but not all fields from the Available Fields list, the top checkbox changes to to indicate that one or more fields have been selected, but not all fields.
  • (per-field checkbox) — Use the checkbox to the left of a field name to select that field. To clear the selection of a field, clear the checkbox.
  • — After you make the appropriate checkbox selections on the Available Fields list, you can click the right green arrow button to add the selected fields to the Metadata View Fields. (This arrow becomes active when you make selections on the Available Field list.)

Metadata Search Fields Information and Options

The Metadata Search Fields list contains the fields that have been assigned as Metadata Search fields to appear when you search using Include Metadata. To remove the assignment of fields from the list, use the appropriate checkboxes to select one or more or all fields, as follows:

  • Field Name – The name of a metadata field that has been assigned to the Metadata Search Fields list. See the Search Metadata list later in this topic for ths list of default fields that are included.  Note that the contents field is ALWAYS included and cannot be removed, as it is required to search for content in a document.
  • (top-level field checkbox) — Use the checkbox that appears at the top of the list of fields to select all fields. To clear the selection of all fields in the list, clear the top checkbox.If you select one or more but not all fields, the top checkbox changes to to indicate that one or more fields have been selected, but not all fields.
  • (per-field checkbox) — Use the checkbox to the left of a field name to select that field. To clear the selection of a field, clear the checkbox.
  • (left red arrow) — After you make the appropriate checkbox selections on the Metadata View Fields list, click the left red arrow to move the selected fields back to the Available Fields list. (This arrow becomes active when you make selections on the Metadata Search Fields list. )

Metadata Search Fields: Save or Discard Changes

If you do not save your changes before navigating away, you will be prompted to either save your changes and continue navigating away, discard your changes and continue navigating away, or cancel your changes and remain in the current location.

  • Save – From the toolbar, saves the changes to the Metadata Search Fields.
  • Discard Changes – From the toolbar, cancels the changes to the Metadata Search Fields.

Metadata Search Fields: Save to and Load from Template Options

If you have the appropriate permissions, you can save your field selections to a template or load the field selections from a template. To do this, click the ellipses to the right of Metadata Search Fields in the tree of Project Settings, as follows:

Note: Save to and Load from operations for this setting observe an "overwrite" behavior. For example, for a Load from operation, your current settings are replaced by the settings from the selected template/settings. Note that some settings, such as Patterns, Tags, Domain Lists, Alias Lists and Excluded Content observe an "append" behavior instead.

  • Save to Template - If you have Add/Edit permissions to Metadata Search Fields templates in the Organization, you can use the Save to Template option to save your current field selections to a selected Organization template. You can either select an existing Organization template (including the Default Metadata Search Fields template), or you can select the top-level (New Template,) which launches the New Template dialog.
  • Load from Template - If you have Add/Edit permissions to Metadata Search Fields in the Project, you can use the Load from Template option to load the field selections from a selected template (from a list of available Organization templates). The loaded settings then appear and are saved automatically. Note that loading from a System template requires System-level View permission for a given Setting. (This means you must be a System User in a role with at least View permission to see a list of System templates for a particular type of template.)

Search Metadata

By default, Digital Reef searches a subset of metadata fields for a term search. To customize this list, drag-and-drop fields from the left section to this section.

Note: There is a performance impact associated with the number of metadata fields included as part of a search. Therefore, try to limit your list to the key fields you need, or be aware that your search performance will be impacted.

The Include Metadata option expands the entire search query to include the following list of Search fields by default:

  • author
  • category
  • checkedby
  • client
  • comment
  • comments
  • company
  • contents If you want to restrict a given clause keyword in a search query to content only, you can type content:: followed by the keyword, or content:: followed by a set of grouped keywords separated by the appropriate Boolean (for example, content::memo or content::(brokerage OR memo). If you provide a query such as war OR content::peace, the software will expand the search of the keyword war to include a common subset of metadata fields such as subject::war OR author::war, but will restrict the search of the keyword peace to content only. Note that for emails, a content:: search applies to both the email subject and the email body.
  • department
  • editor
  • edocsubject
  • filename
  • fullparticipants
  • group
  • keywords
  • modifiedby
  • owner
  • subject
  • title

See The Metadata List for descriptions of these fields.

For more information, see Using the Include Metadata Option.