Condition Types

Condition Types

Search distinguishes 4 condition types: Must-have (default), Nice-to-have, Should-have, and Must-not-have. Conditions can be used on any expression, but not with OR-groups or within Object-group expressions.

Must-have Expressions

"Java developer" javascript

This is the default condition type. It's often described as a filter, filtering out every result that does not satisfy the query part. It applies whenever no other condition is explicitly mentioned. The example query above will return all documents mentioning both "Java developer" and Javascript.

Nice-to-have Expressions

"Java developer" %javascript

Nice-to-have search expressions are marked with a preceding %. They influence the ranking by scoring matching search results higher, but generally without filtering non-matching results out. The example query above will return all Java developers, with or without javascript in their CV, but the ones that also contain javascript will be ranked higher in the results.

If a query consists solely of nice-to-have and should-have expressions, the result set contains all documents matching at least one of them.

In the API, the nice-to-have query parts are marked with condition FAVORED.

Should-have Expressions

"Java developer" ^javascript

Should-have search expressions are marked with a preceding ^. Their behavior is identical to Nice-to-have Expressions except that they carry more weight when modifying the ranking.

In the API, the should-have query parts are marked with condition STRONGLY_FAVORED.

Must-not-have Expressions

Java developer -city:Amsterdam

Query expressions marked by a preceding - are must-not-have expressions. They exclude all documents matching this expression from the result.