Creating a filter with the Expression Builder

You can use filters to isolate parts of web traffic for a Watchpoint or reports.

Filters are built using parentheses and combinations of the following symbols: &&, ||, and !, which represent AND, OR, and NOT operators. The AND, OR, and NOT operators are interchangeable with the &&, ||, and ! operators respectively.

If you want to locate all people with "thom" at the beginning of their names, compose the following filter:

This expression represents a search for all entries with an object class of type "person" in which the common name begins with "Thom". By default, search is case-sensitive. To make the search case-insensitive, use the "ignorecase" attribute, so that replacing "thom" with "Thom" or "THOM" would yield the same results:

Search filters can be nested to any level:

((objectclass=person)&&((cn="Thomas Smith")||(cn startwith "thom" ignorecase)))

This filter looks for all entries with object class person in which the common name is either "Thomas Smith"or begins with "Thom". A logical operator should appear before the parenthesis enclosing the group of compares that it affects. You can specify the order for operators by nesting parentheses.

To create a filter

To perform this procedure, you must have Operator-level access, or higher.

1. Open the Add new filter dialog.
   For example, in a Real User Analyzer, point to the Administration > Watchpoint management, and click Filter library. On the Action menu, click Add new filter.
2. In the Name box, enter a name for the filter, such as Traffic to my application.
3. Click Build a filter expression.
    The Expression Builder tool opens.
4. In the Field list, click URI Host.
5. In the Comparison list, click contains.
6. In the Comparison box, type the URL of your web application (for example, www.example.com).
7. Click Add, and then click Save.
   
   The new filter is added to the list of filters. The following figure shows how to create a filter in the Expression Builder tool.

Composing a filter to identify a particular web application

To create a filter that isolates static object types

To perform this procedure, you must have Operator-level access, or higher.

Create a filter to detect objects with the following extensions: .gif, .jpg, .jpeg, .css, .js, and .png.

1. In a Real User Analyzer, point to the Administration > Watchpoint management, and click Filter library.
2. On the Action menu, click Add.
3. In the Name box type a name for the filter, such as Static object types.
4. Click Build a filter expression.
    The Expression Builder tool opens.
5. In the Field list, click URI File Extension.
6. In the Comparison list, click ends with.
7. In the Comparison box, type png, and click Add.
8. Click the button.
    The Reference List for the selected field opens.
9. Select a value that corresponds to another one of the file extensions that you want to find — for example, .jpg.
10. Click Add with OR.
11. Add other necessary static file extensions for the filter in the same manner.
12. Click Save.
13. In the Filter description box, enter Objects in the list of static file types.
14. Click Save.
    
    The new filter is added to the list of filters.

Composing a filter to identify static object types

Filters support multinational character encoding. The following figure shows an example of using Chinese characters:

Composing a filter with non-ASCII (multibyte) characters

Related topics

Filter-expression-examples

Filter-operators-in-the-Expression-Builder

Deleting-a-filter-with-the-Expression-Builder