Find components

As your list of components grows, you can use basic search tools as well as build more advanced queries to find the component you need. If you want to save your search results, you can export them as a CSV file . If you have permissions, you can also search for text in multiple components at once using the Find and Replace option in the Components browser.

Tips and tricks

  • Using parenthesis. Inspire recognizes a parenthesis character ( ) as something that indicates a grouping of search items. If you want to search for a text value that actually contains a parenthesis character ( ), you must tell Inspire to interpret it literally. To do that, use a slash \ before any parenthesis character ( ).

    For example, if you want to search for the following value: Chapter1_Intro(with_endnotes), in the Search for box you would enter Chapter1_Intro\(with_endnotes\).

How does search work?

There are multiple ways you can find content in a component with Inspire:

Content search

  • You can use this basic search to find words or phrases in components.
  • Content search is a full-text search of your XML documents using indexed words automatically built by Inspire.
  • This is a faster option for searching because Inspire keeps a list of indexed words for each XML document when content is created and updated.
  • However, you can't use content search to find a single letter or number.

Duplicate content search

You can search through all components in a folder to see if there is XML content that is used repeatedly. This option creates a Find Duplicate Content Report.

  • You can Ignore Whitespace
  • You can include XML code
  • You can choose to Ignore ID Attributes if you don't want to search inside id tags
  • You can choose to Ignore All Attributes if you only want to search for text that isn't in an attribute tag

Advanced search

  • You can use a query builder to write XPath expressions to search your XML documents.
  • This search is slower than a content search but gives much more flexibility for finding exact matches and structural conditions.

Find and Replace

  • You must have specific permissions to use Find and Replace.
  • This option is available on the Selected Components pane.
  • You can search and create a report on the number of times the search text appears in components without opening them.
  • You can also update a component without opening it by using the Replace option.

Basic search tools

If you only need to find one component and you know the title or a unique word or phrase to identify the component, you can use basic search tools.

Explore folders

  • If you know the folder where a component is stored, you can expand the folder structure in the Folders pane to find the component.

Sort the list

  • You can use any column in the list to show the components you want to see first and avoid scrolling through the entire list.

Content search

  • You can use the search box to enter a key word and then click the magnifying glass.
  • This runs a database full-text search and will only work for indexed words.

Duplicate content search

  • Search through all components in a folder to see if there is XML content that is used repeatedly.
  • This option creates a Find Duplicate Content Report.

Advanced search tools

You can use the advanced search feature to build queries.

Use operators and parameters

  • To enter a combination of unique words or phrases, you can use:
    • The operators (And, Or)
    • Grouping features ()
    • Multiple parameters to find more exact matches

Find elements

  • You can build queries to find an element and see a list of all its values.
  • This is useful if you want to check that the correct values are being used for an element.

Use the advanced content query builder

  • You can also write XPath expressions for greater search flexibility and to search for structural conditions.
  • For example, you can write an XPath expression to find all table titles where someone used the actual word "table".
  • To search for this you would enter the following XPath expression:
//table/title[contains(.,"table")]

Find and replace text

You must have specific permissions to use Find and Replace.

After you select a non-binary, unlocked file from the Components browser, you can look in the Selected Components pane for the snowflake icon.
  • This opens a screen that allows you to search and create a report on the number of times the search text appears.
  • You can also update a component without opening it by using the Replace option on the Find and Replace screen. Inspire creates a report showing you how many times the text was found and replaced.