Typeahead Search widget
Summarize
Summary of Typeahead Search widget
The Typeahead Search widget provides a predictive search experience by showing word suggestions as users type in the search field. This base system widget is ready to use in your Service Portal or can be cloned and customized to fit your specific business needs. It enhances user experience by enabling faster and more intuitive searches.
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Instance Options
The widget includes configurable instance options to tailor its appearance and behavior on a portal page. Key configurable options include:
- Presentation Title: Sets the placeholder text appearing before typing begins (e.g., "search" or "what are you looking for").
- Color: Determines whether the search button is filled or outlined.
- Glyph: Specifies the icon shown beside the search field; the default is a search icon but can be changed to any icon by name (e.g., "search-plus").
- Size: Controls font size and widget height with options xs, sm, md, and lg.
- Behavior Limit: Sets the number of displayed suggestions or typeahead entries (default is 15), depending on whether search suggestions are enabled.
- Contextual Search Sources: Limits search results to specific data sources, such as the Service Catalog, allowing contextual filtering of results.
AI Search Integration
If AI Search is enabled in your portal, additional options become available:
- Search Application: Defines the search engine, and limits for search results and suggestions. This can override the portal-level configuration at the widget level.
- Search Results Configuration: Controls how search results are displayed after the user submits a query; this too can be overridden at the widget level.
- Disable All Suggestions: Option to completely disable search suggestions.
- Placeholder: Customizable text shown in the search box before input, defaulting to "Search".
- AI Search Source Filter: Specifies which tables or external data sources users can search within the portal.
Practical Use for ServiceNow Customers
This widget enables you to provide users with a more efficient and user-friendly search experience in your Service Portal. By configuring instance options, you can match the widget’s appearance and search scope to your portal’s branding and user needs. With AI Search integration, you can leverage advanced search capabilities, control the data sources users search against, and refine how results and suggestions are presented.
To customize or extend the widget, you can clone it and adjust settings or appearance as required. This makes it a flexible tool for enhancing search functionality across various portal pages.
Next Steps
- Create and edit portal pages using the Service Portal Designer.
- Configure widget instances to tailor the Typeahead Search behavior.
- Clone the widget if you need a customized version for your business requirements.
Predictive search feature that shows words as users type. You can use this base system widget as-is in your portal or clone it to suit your own business needs.
Instance options
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Presentation | |
| Title | The name or words that appear in the search field before a user starts typing. For example, search or what are you looking for |
| Color | Whether the search button beside the search field is filled in or not |
| glyph | The icon that appears in the search field beside the widget. The search icon is the default. To use a different icon, type the name of the icon in the field, for example search-plus. For a list of icons to choose from, open the instance options for the Icon Link widget. |
| Size | Determines the font size and height of the widget. Choose from xs, sm, md, and lg. |
| Behavior | |
| Limit | If search suggestions is enabled, enter the number of suggestion entries you want to display. If search suggestions is disabled, enter the number of typeahead entries you want to display. The default is 15. See Enable and disable search suggestions. |
| Contextual Search Sources | Limit the results available in the typeahead search by only configuring specific search sources. For example, users searching in the Service Catalog only see results for the Service Catalog when that search sources is configure. For more information on contextual search, see Configure Search Sources available on a page |
| AI Search | |
| Search Application | Defines search experience settings for the widget, such as the search engine, search results limit, and suggestions limit. By default, the widget uses the same search application configuration as the portal, but you can override this configuration at the widget level. For more information on defining a search application configuration, see Defining search application configurations. |
| Search Results Configuration | Defines how search results are displayed after using the widget. By default, the widget uses the same search results configuration as the portal, but you can override this configuration at the widget level. For more information on defining a search results configuration, see Define a composite dataset. |
| Disable All Suggestions | Option to disable search suggestions. |
| Placeholder | Text that appears in the search box before the user enters anything. By default, the placeholder text is Search. |
| AI Search Source Filter | Content that portal users can search on, including tables in your instance or external data sources. For more information, see Defining search sources. |