# Is there a way to give a unique ID to a field? **URL:** \ **Category:** Elasticsearch\ **Created:** [August 28, 2011, 3:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268 "2011-08-28T15:16:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ogregras](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/cdc98d/32.png) [@ogregras](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ogregras)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2011, 3:16pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/1 "2011-08-28T15:16:10Z")
I'm currently working with facets and I wish my application URL to keep information about the facets that have been selected by the user so far. For example: [http://www.example.com/widgets/](http://www.example.com/widgets/)_manufacturer-bang\_olufse_/_color-blue_ Each selected facet is added to the URL and a resulting search, for all facets in the URL, is done. But let's say the manufacturer in this example is indexed as "Bang&Olufse", I want to to be able to find it using the friendly token saved in the URL. If I search using my current friendly token,"bang\_olufse", I won't find anything. I'd like a generic way to target a specific field using a unique id/token. I don't simply want the search to be case insensitive, I'd like a way to create a real custom friendly URL token ("bang\_olufse" for example, or even "b\_o") and have a way to find the right field using it. Is there a way to do that? I though about generating a unique string like "\_\_faceturl-bang\_olufse" and append it _to the content of the field itself_, so a following search for "\_\_faceturl-[FRIENDLY\_URL\_TOKEN]" would find it. But this is really ugly and force me to deal with the fact that the content contains this id that I don't want to display. Any suggestions on how to map a friendly URL token to a specific field? Thanks in advance! ---
**Author:** ![ogregras](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/cdc98d/32.png) [@ogregras](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ogregras)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2011, 4:06pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/2 "2011-08-28T16:06:30Z")
I guess my question was stupid: I simply have to add a "manufacturer\_friendly" field when indexing the record, and search on this field using the friendly tokens from the URL! ---
**Author:** ![ogregras](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/cdc98d/32.png) [@ogregras](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ogregras)\ **Post date:** [August 28, 2011, 9:12pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/3 "2011-08-28T21:12:20Z")
I'm not too sure about my "solution" after all... If I create a field dedicated to the "friendly" value, I have to get both this field and the field containing the original value from a facet search : the friendly value to create the URL token and the original value to display the facet value to the user. The problem is, by setting both of those fields to my query's TermsFacetBuilder, the result is a _mix_ of both fields.. I have no way to associate the friendly value and the original value of the same term! The workaround I'm thinking about is the following.. - 3 fields: "full", "friendly" and "fullAndFriendly" - When I index a document, I add values in these three fields: - When I search, I ask ES to use the "fullAndFriendly" field for the facet to return. I then parse the returned value to get both full values and friendly values for the facet's terms (yark!). - I can now display the facet and its terms using the full values and build the URLs corresponding to this facet using the friendly values. - When there is a friendly facet token in the URL, I use it in my search and tell ES to use the "friendly" field to search this value. There must be an easiest way to do this! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Ivan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/df788c/32.png) [@Ivan](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Ivan)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2011, 2:32pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/4 "2011-08-29T14:32:43Z")
Another possible way to reduce the number of steps (by 1) is to use a term script where the value is similar to your fullAndFriendly field. ``` "facets" : { "manufacturers" : { "terms" : { "field" : "full", "size" : 10, "script" : "term + '[uniqueSeparatorString]' + _source.friendly" } } } ``` That said, I am unable to set the uniqueSeparatorString to be anything besides a number without getting "Error: unresolvable property or identifier ..." It would be great to have a value\_script for term facets, but I am not sure if that makes sense. -- Ivan On Sun, Aug 28, 2011 at 5:12 PM, ogregras [ogregras@gmail.com](mailto:ogregras@gmail.com) wrote: > I'm not too sure about my "solution" after all... > > If I create a field dedicated to the "friendly" value, I have to get both > this field and the field containing the original value from a facet search : > the friendly value to create the URL token and the original value to display > the facet value to the user. The problem is, by setting both of those fields > to my query's TermsFacetBuilder, the result is a mix of both fields.. I have > no way to associate the friendly value and the original value of the same > term! > The workaround I'm thinking about is the following.. > > - 3 fields: "full", "friendly" and "fullAndFriendly" > - When I index a document, I add values in these three fields: > - Its full value in the "full" field > - Its generated friendly value in the "friendly" field > - And finally a concatenated value in the "fullAndFriendly" > field consisting in : fullValue + [uniqueSeparatorString] + friendlyValue > > - When I search, I ask ES to use the "fullAndFriendly" field for the facet > to return. I then parse the returned value to get both full values and > friendly values for the facet's terms (yark!). > - I can now display the facet and its terms using the full values and build > the URLs corresponding to this facet using the friendly values. > - When there is a friendly facet token in the URL, I use it in my search and > tell ES to use the "friendly" field to search this value. > > There must be an easiest way to do this! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![ogregras](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/cdc98d/32.png) [@ogregras](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/ogregras)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2011, 3:24pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/5 "2011-08-29T15:24:24Z")
First, thanks for the help Ivan! I was pretty sure I would have no help with such a specific question! I may investigate the term scripts, I wasn't aware of those! But since adding a custom metadata to a field doesn't seem to be currently possible, I may also stick with my workaround. It requires 3 fields, which is not the ideal, but it works great. I just need to make sure the friendly tokens I generate CAN'T contain one of more of the characters that are used in the "uniqueSeparatorString". Then by spliting the fullAndFriendly field using lastIndexOf([uniqueSeparatorString]) , I'm 100% sure the left part is the full value and the right part is the friendly value. But it's still ugly... Thanks again. ---
**Author:** ![Ivan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/df788c/32.png) [@Ivan](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/Ivan)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2011, 9:02pm UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/6 "2011-08-29T21:02:47Z")
On Mon, Aug 29, 2011 at 11:24 AM, ogregras [ogregras@gmail.com](mailto:ogregras@gmail.com) wrote: > First, thanks for the help Ivan! I was pretty sure I would have no help with > such a specific question! I don't think your question is very specific. Your use case for facets is typical and the combination of requiring not-analyzed fields for the facet and user-friendly description is annoying. Luckily for many of my use cases, the facets are known in advance, so I can provide an external mapping between facet and friendly value. -- Ivan ---
**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/elastic/original/3X/1/a/1ac57faf039f6b580b3f104ef42a2a89e41014de.png) [@system](https://discuss.elastic.co/u/system)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2017, 3:55am UTC](https://discuss.elastic.co/t/is-there-a-way-to-give-a-unique-id-to-a-field/5268/7 "2017-07-06T03:55:39Z")