Configuring full text search for a server group

Full Text Search (FTS) within Action Request System is made up of the following primary components for Lucene search:

FTScore—Manages the FTSfunctionality by using Lucene library
FTSIndexer—Part of AR System server
FTS Searcher—Part of AR System server and FTS plug-in server
FTS plug-in—A Java plug-in, which runs under the FTS plug-in server to serve search requests from the remote AR System servers (which are not indexer servers) in the server group.
Index—Lucene index files

Related topics

Navigating the AR System Management Console to manage server groups

How-FTS-high-availability-works-in-a-server-group-environment

Important

With Elasticsearch you do not need FTS plug-in, multiple indexers or searchers, because the AR System server directly communicates with Elasticsearch server to query data by using the REST APIs.

As events occur within AR System that cause data to be indexed, the AR System server sends a message to the FTS indexer, which then adds, deletes, or updates data within the index. Other events could include a request to search the index.

If AR System server is not the indexer in a server group, the AR System server sends the search request to the FTS plug-in which is running under remote FTS plug-in server on the indexer server (where the index exists). The remote FTS plug-in server returns the search results to AR System server and then the AR System server processes the data accordingly.

If AR System server is the indexer, it performs the search requests locally in the index and then returns the search results to the client.

When you configure a server group for FTS, ensure that the following conditions are met:

The required number of servers are designated as FTS indexing servers in the server group.
The FTS indexing server is the AR System server that also has the FTS collection and conf directories located on a local disk.
The FTS indexing server hosts a FTS plug-in server for serving the search requests from the remote AR System servers that are not designated as indexer server.

You can designate a server as the FTS indexing server by ranking it in the AR System Server Group Operation Ranking form. For more information, see Setting-failover-rankings-for-servers-and-operations.

FTS uses only one plug-in server as the reader (searcher). The reader plug-in is installed on the FTS indexing server. Only the designated indexing FTS server has a ranking entry in the AR System Server Group Operation Ranking form. This AR System server acts as FTS indexer and FTS searcher for local search requests. The reader (searcher) FTS plug-in server serves as the searcher for all the other AR System servers in the server group that are not designated as an indexing server, so you must configure all other non-indexing servers to connect to the searcher FTS plug-in server instance running on the FTS indexing server. The searcher instance runs on a separate port on the FTS indexing server.

The events that cause data to be written to the index result in data being put into the AR System database as a queue of items to index. Only the FTS indexing server processes index requests from this queue. However, any instance of AR System server can send a search request to its corresponding FTS plug-in. This ensures index integrity. For more information, see FTS-plug-in-configuration. There is no search fail-over for the AR System server indexer.

Tips

When you perform Full Text Search on a computer, the FTS searcher uses the stop words configured on the corresponding indexer server. The FTS searcher does not use the stop words configured on the computer on which Full Text Search is performed.
When Full Text Search happens on a computer, the value of the AR_SERVER_INFO_FT_SUPPORT_EXACT_MATCH_SEARCH configuration on the corresponding indexer server is used to perform Full Text Search. The value of this configuration on the computer on which full text search is performed has no role to play in full text search.

Configuring FTS for a server group

If you use FTS in a server group, you can designate more than one server as indexing server in the server group.

Each FTS indexing server has its own virtual queue of data to index. When AR System queues data for indexing in parallel to AR Database changes in data, it queues separately for each FTS Indexing server as designated by the Server Group Ranking form for FTS.

In a server group, the server that owns the full text indexing operation processes all pending indexing tasks regardless of their server of origin. (The other servers have read-only access to the index files.)

FTS is configured after all servers in the group have been installed and configured to run within a server group. The FTS collection and FTS configuration directories should be located on the same computer.

To set up FTS in a server group

Rank the FTS servers in the AR System Server Group Operation Ranking form. For more information, see Setting-failover-rankings-for-servers-and-operations.
You should use the FTS indexing server, which is ranked 1 in the AR System Server Group Operation Ranking form, for searching and the other FTS indexing server, which is ranked 2, as the failover server.
In a browser, open the BMC Remedy AR System Administration Console, and select System > General > FTS Configuration.

Managing, configuring and checking status of FTS-enabled servers

The FTS Management screen on the AR System Management Console enables you to manage, configure, and check the status of all the FTS-enabled servers in a server group.

You can perform the following tasks on this screen:

Update FTS configuration for all the servers in a server group.
Initiate re-indexing for the entire server or for a form.
If the re-indexing operation is in progress, check the status of that operation.

Required permissions

You must have at least one of the following permissions to access the FTS Management screen:

AR System Administrator
AR System Configuration Administrator
Integration Administrator

To configure FTS settings for a server in the server group

The FTS Management screen enables you to perform the following operations:

Action	Description
View the list of servers in the server group and also view the current status and FTS configuration on a particular server.	The FTS Configuration panel displays the following details: If the selected server is FTS indexed? Is it just a reader or an indexer? If it is an indexer, whether indexing is enabled or not? Whether re-indexing is in progress?
Select a server in the FTS Configuration panel	The Configuration panel displays the following details: The Configuration panel displays detailed information for the server you select in the FTS Configuration panel. The Indexer section is disabled if the selected server is not an indexer. Click Apply to apply all settings in the Configuration panel to the selected server.
View the reindex options	You can view the following section of the Configuration panel only if the selected server is an FTS indexer. This section enables you to perform the following tasks: Re-index the entire server or a single form. Select either Server or Form Name to re-index.
View the reindex options	The following section of the panel is visible only if the selected server is an FTS indexer and the re-index operation is in progress. This section shows the current status of the re-index process and provides the following details: When the reindex started? How many rows were to be processed? How many rows are processed so far? Failures (if any) during re-index Re-index progress
Reindex the indexer server	The Reindex option on the FTS Management screen enables you to reindex the indexer server. Select either Server or Form to trigger the reindex operation. Server —the re-index operations start on all the indexer servers. Form —the re-index operation starts for the selected form on all the indexer servers. Click Reindex.