About Indexing Modes


An indexing mode is a collection of settings in the policy style file (style.plc) that affects Verity engine's indexing behavior. An indexing mode affects the engine's performance during indexing plus the layout of the index data in a collection.

What Indexing Modes Do

Selecting an indexing mode sets a number of metaparameters that are used to build optimized collection components called VDBs. A VDB refers to a proprietary data structure that Verity uses to store different kinds of collection data, including the full-word index, documents table, and optional spanning word list. When a VDB is optimized its contents are organized in the best possible layout so that the engine's search performance over the collection is most efficient.

Dynamically Changing Modes

Modes can be changed and updated dynamically for an indexer. This means you can change modes even after some indexing has taken place.

Background vs. Administrative Optimizations

Indexing modes are intended to optimize the way the Verity engine operates during indexing time on a continuous basis. Some optimizations such as squeezing deleted documents can be done only by administrative tools, like VdkAdminOptimize and mkvdk -optimize. For more information on VdkAdminOptimize, refer to the Verity Developer's Kit documentation. For information on mkvdk and its options, refer to the Verity K2 Indexers Guide.

The administrative functions are intended to do all the work necessary to optimize a collection for fast retrieval all in one call. After the function is performed, the VDBs of a collection are optimally packed. You can then make changes to the collection, such as submitting new documents, and make the collection nonoptimal again.





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