Running Federated Search, Recent & Saved Searches

Federated search is the single query box that reaches across everything StretchSearch and its sibling apps have indexed — projects, pages, crawl targets, crawl jobs, SEO findings, and ranking previews — and returns one ranked, faceted result list.

What federated search covers

A single query fans out across result types from multiple StretchSuite apps:

• Projects (from StretchProjects)
• Pages (indexed pages in StretchSearch)
• Targets and crawl jobs (from the crawler)
• SEO findings (from StretchSEO)
• Ranking previews (from StretchSearch)

Each result carries its app, type, title, description, URL, status, and the project it belongs to.

How results are ranked

Results are scored by an algorithm called lexical_freshness_authority_v1. The score blends four signals: lexical match (how well your terms hit the title, description, URL, app, and type), a base score per result type, freshness (recently updated items rank higher, decaying over ~90 days), and authority (rankings and pages carry more weight than targets or jobs). When enabled, an optional semantic re-rank refines the top results using embeddings; if it's off or unavailable, the original order is returned unchanged.

Run a search

1. Open the Search box in StretchSearch.
2. Type your query and run it. An empty query returns a broad recent-activity view.
3. Narrow with filters: apps (limited to stretchsearch, stretchprojects, stretchcrawler, stretchseo), types, project, and status.
4. Adjust the limit (1–50 results) if you need more or fewer.

Use facets

Every result set comes with facets — counts by app, type, project, and status — sorted by frequency. Click a facet to drill in: for example, show only seo_finding results, or only items in the Northwind Coffee — Q3 SEO project. Facets are the fastest way to turn a broad query into a focused list.

Recent searches

StretchSearch remembers your recent queries automatically (the most recent, de-duplicated). Open Recent to re-run a prior search in one click. Recent history is scoped to your organization.

Save a search

1. Run the query and apply the filters you want to keep.
2. Choose Save search and give it a name (it defaults to the query text).
3. Save. It appears under Saved searches for quick reuse.
4. To remove one, open Saved searches and choose Delete.

A query is required to save — you can't save an empty search.

A realistic example

Maya searches thin content and immediately sees SEO findings, the pages they came from, and any related ranking previews. She clicks the seo_finding type facet to isolate findings, then the Northwind Coffee — Q3 SEO project facet to scope to her engagement. She saves the filtered search as Northwind — thin content so she can re-check it each week without rebuilding the filters.

Tips

• Lead with distinctive terms (a domain, a finding type, a brand). Short, specific queries rank best.
• Use the type facet to separate "what's wrong" (findings) from "what exists" (pages) instantly.
• Save the searches you run repeatedly during an engagement — weekly audits become one click.
• If results feel stale, remember freshness decays over ~90 days; recently updated items naturally rise.

FAQ

Can I search across other organizations' data? No. Federated search is scoped to your organization; you only see your own projects, pages, and findings.

Why did an app filter return nothing? The apps filter only accepts stretchsearch, stretchprojects, stretchcrawler, and stretchseo. Other values are ignored.

Are recent and saved searches shared with my team? They're kept per organization scope. Saved searches you create are available for reuse within that scope.