SeeSearchWords search engine word highlighter

Free version 1.6 - Download
Retail version 2.6 - US$29
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"SeeSearchWords has rapidly become indispensable for our intranet portal"

SeeSearchWords highlights search words that were used at a major search engine in your own web pages - or a DotNetNuke search:

A user types in a search at Bing, Yahoo, Ask or AOL (eg SeeSearchWords highlight)
The search engine shows a list of results
When the user clicks on a result, the live page is shown with the search words and any variants highlighted.

For a DotNetNuke (DNN) search (example):

The user types in a search eg "SeeSearchWords highlight", and clicks on Search.
The Search Results tab is shown. SeeSearchWords highlights any instance of the search words in the displayed results, including any variants on the search words.
When the user clicks on a result, the page is shown with the search words and any variants highlighted.

The highlighting examples in this documentation are like this, ie the text is bold and dark blue with a light green background. However the real highlighter uses a different format: bold and red with a yellow background. The real highlighter also adds a message at the top of the page like this (except that it will have a yellow background):

SeeSearchWords has highlighted your Bing search

The highlighting occurs whenever a user navigates to your site from one of the supported search engines - see below for details of the page types supported. You do not need to alter your pages at all. The highlighting is similar to the "Cached" option provided by some search engines, except that it works on the current live version of your page. And SeeSearchWords also highlights similar words, so if you searched for learn then SeeSearchWords would highlight learn, learns and learning - if these words are on your page.

Free and Retail versions

A free version is available for download at the phdcc DNN site.

A retail version is available - full details below - this lets you:

Change the highlighting style
Add navigation arrows to move between search words
Change or remove the header message
Use alternative word stemming rules (eg German and French)
Only highlight in specified section of each page
Support further search engines
Restrict the sites where highlighting works

Licence text

Installation Instructions - freeware version

SeeSearchWords has been designed to add to an existing ASP.NET application (ie it is not normally installed as a stand-alone web application). SeeSearchWords will work with any web application that returns HTML as .aspx pages, including the DotNetNuke (DNN) version 3, 4 and 5 framework.

Go to the phdcc DNN downloads page and download the SeeSearchWords file ssw_free.zip.
Unzip the download into a clean directory.
Upload phdcc.fis.Find.dll and phdcc.SeeSearchWords.dll into the application bin directory.
Save a copy of the application root Web.Config file, in case of any problems.
For IIS 6: In the Web.Config file, add an entry to the <httpModules> section
<httpModules> <add name="SeeSearchWords" type="com.phdcc.SeeSearchWords.SeeSearchWordsModule, phdcc.SeeSearchWords"/> </httpModules>
If <httpModules> does not already exist, create it (within the <system.web> section).

For IIS 7: In the Web.Config file, add an entry to the <system.webServer><modules> section

<system.webServer>
<modules>
  <add name="SeeSearchWords" type="com.phdcc.SeeSearchWords.SeeSearchWordsModule,
    phdcc.SeeSearchWords" preCondition="managedHandler"/>
</modules>
</system.webServer>

If <system.webServer><modules> does not already exist, create it (within the <configuration> section).

Your application should automatically restart and use SeeSearchWords when you next access it (because the Web.Config file has changed).

Technical Information

SeeSearchWords is an ASP.NET application, for MS-servers, eg IIS 5, IIS 6 and IIS 7, including shared hosts.

SeeSearchWords only highlights search words in web pages that are processed by ASP.NET. In most cases, this means that it only highlights search words in pages that have the .aspx file extension. However, IIS can be set up so that other file types such as .htm can be processed by ASP.NET.

SeeSearchWords currently supports Bing, Yahoo, Ask and AOL, including their Advanced Search options.
Tested in DotNetNuke (DNN) 3.0.13 and 3.1.0 with Friendly URLs on and off. Also runs OK in DNN 3.2.2, DNN 4.0.2 and DNN 04.08.00, and DNN 5.2.1 and DNN 5.2.3.

SeeSearchWords will not work with compressed streams, eg in conjunction with filters that apply a gzip or deflate Content-Encoding such as the DNN [Host][Host Settings][Advanced Settings][Performance Settings][Compression Setting] and blowery.org's HttpCompressionModule.
If you use Spohn Software's SlipStream Camouflage module, please update it to version 1.5.2 or later so that it works with SeeSearchWords.

Let us know if you want us to write a version of this software that will intercept all requests, eg an ISAPI filter. An ISAPI filter may be harder to install on a shared server.

SeeSearchWords Retail version

The retail version of SeeSearchWords lets you customise the features provided in the free version, and adds some new options:

Change the highlighting

Add navigation arrows to move between search words

Change or remove the header message

Use alternative word stemming rules (inc German and French)

Only highlight in specified section of each page

Support further search engines

Restrict the sites where highlighting works

Installation instructions

SeeSearchWords has been designed to add to an existing ASP.NET application (ie it is not normally installed as a stand-alone web application). SeeSearchWords will work with any web application that returns HTML as .aspx pages, including the DotNetNuke (DNN) version 3, 4 and 5 framework.

To install the retail version of SeeSearchWords, you need to add the runtime DLLs to the web application bin directory and amend the application Web.Config file in three places - carefully. Additional configuration information can be put in further files anywhere in the application directory structure.

The retail version of SeeSearchWords is compatible with DotNetNuke (DNN) 3, 4 and 5. However, there is no facility to configure SeeSearchWords from within the DNN online configuration screens, ie there is no DNN admin module.

The retail version is supplied as a ZIP file, named ssw_retail.zip or similar.
Unzip the download into a clean directory.

Upload phdcc.fis.Find.dll and phdcc.SeeSearchWords.dll into the web application bin directory.

Save a copy of your web application root Web.Config file, in case of any problems.
For IIS 6: In the Web.Config file, add an entry to the <httpModules> section:
<httpModules>
  <add name="SeeSearchWords" type="com.phdcc.SeeSearchWords.SeeSearchWordsModule,
    phdcc.SeeSearchWords"/>
</httpModules>
If <httpModules> does not already exist, create it (within the <system.web> section), ie add all the above text.
For IIS 7: In the Web.Config file, add an entry to the <system.webServer><modules> section
<system.webServer>
<modules>
  <add name="SeeSearchWords" type="com.phdcc.SeeSearchWords.SeeSearchWordsModule,
    phdcc.SeeSearchWords" preCondition="managedHandler"/>
</modules>
</system.webServer>
If <system.webServer><modules> does not already exist, create it (within the <configuration> section).
Add these lines in the <configSections> section:
<configSections>
  <sectionGroup name="phdcc"> <section name="SeeSearchWords"
    type="com.phdcc.SeeSearchWords.ConfigSectionHandler,phdcc.SeeSearchWords" />
    </sectionGroup>
</configSections>
If <configSections> does not already exist, create it (within the <configuration> section), ie add all the above text just after <configuration>.
Add all these lines in the <configuration> section, typically just after </configSections>:
<phdcc> <SeeSearchWords>
  <add key="options" value="debuginfo,arrows"/>
  </SeeSearchWords> </phdcc>
Each instance of <add .. /> specifies an parameter. In this case, the "options" parameter has been set to "debuginfo,arrows" to tell SeeSearchWords that you want to see debug output and that you want navigation arrows to be shown. A full list of available parameters is listed below.
As well as <add .. />, you can use <clear/> to clear all previously added parameters, and <remove key="param" /> to remove the specified parameter.
Your application should automatically restart and use SeeSearchWords when you next access it (because the Web.Config file has changed).

SeeSearchWords only reads its options when the web application starts. Any update to Web.Config will restart the application, so SeeSearchWords will immediately see any changes that you make in Web.Config. However if you make changes to other SeeSearchWords configuration files, then you will need to restart the application using Host>Site Settings>Restart Application. (Alternatively you can re-save Web.Config to restart the application.) You may also need to clear your Temporary Internet Files.

Retail parameters

The following parameters can be specified in the phdcc/SeeSearchWords section using <add key="parameter" value="value" />.

Parameter values that include angle-brackets must have these characters 'escaped', eg < must be written as < etc. Because this is confusing, for most parameters there is an option to read the real value from a file instead, as indicated by the From File column - see below for details of how to do this.

Parameter From File Description Default

options Comma-separated list of options:

debuginfo Display SeeSearchWords debug info at the bottom of each page

arrows Display arrows to navigate between search words

headertop Insert the Header at the very start of the page output

headerafterbody Insert the Header just after the page <BODY> tag

headerafterbodyform Insert the Header just after the first <FORM> tag after the page <BODY> tag

HighlightPartialWords Highlights words that start with the search word (as well as those matched by the rules)

HighlightPartialWordsAnywhere Highlights words that contain the search word anywhere (as well as those matched by the rules)

JumpToFirstUse Outputs JavaScript that jumps to the first highlighted instance of a search word on the page

headerafterbodyform

HilitePre @ The HTML used to start highlighting <span style='background:yellow; color:red; font-weight:bold;'>

HilitePost @ The HTML used to end highlighting </span>

HiliteStart @ The HTML comment used to indicate when highlighting should start - see below not set

HiliteEnd @ The HTML comment used to indicate when highlighting should end not set

HiliteArrowBack @ The HTML used as the back navigation arrow <B><</B>

HiliteArrowNext @ The HTML used as the next navigation arrow <B>></B>

HiliteAnchorName @ The A tag base anchor name used for navigation arrows sswanchor

Header @ The HTML used in the header, including template variables - see below see below

rules @ The word matching ruleset, starting with res: or @ - see below res:SeeSearchWords.rulesen.txt

Patterns @ The list of patterns used to detect URLs that contain search words - see below see below

Sites @ The list of sites where highlighting enabled - see below All sites

From file parameters

As stated above, parameter values must have angle-bracket characters 'escaped' when they are used in the Web.Config file. The neater alternative is to store the information in a plain text file, one for each parameter. The parameter value must then contain @ followed by the file path. The path is relative to the web application directory, so a parameter value of @DesktopModules/SSWhipre.Config would obtain the parameter by reading the file SSWhipre.Config in the sub-directory DesktopModules.

It is recommended that you use a filename extension of .Config so as to make the file unreadable by a browser (because IIS bars direct access to such files). The file should be in UTF-8 format.

Here is an example phdcc/SeeSearchWords section in Web.Config:
<phdcc>
  <SeeSearchWords>
    <add key="options" value="arrows" />
    <add key="HilitePre" value="@DesktopModules/SSWhipre.Config" />
    <add key="HilitePost" value="@DesktopModules/SSWhipost.Config" />
    <add key="HiliteArrowBack" value="&lt;i&gt;&amp;lt;&lt;/i&gt;" />
    <add key="HiliteArrowNext" value="&lt;i&gt;&amp;gt;&lt;/i&gt;" />
  </SeeSearchWords>
</phdcc>
As you can see, specifying the HiliteArrowBack and HiliteArrowNext parameters is a bit awkward.
The HilitePre parameter value is obtained from file DesktopModules/SSWhipre.Config, which might contain this:
<SPAN STYLE='background: #ffff99;'><FONT COLOR=blue>
The HilitePost parameter value is obtained from file DesktopModules/SSWhipost.Config, which might contain this:
</FONT></SPAN>
Remember that changes to parameter files will not be read until SeeSearchWords re-starts, eg when the web application Web.Config file is re-saved.

Highlighting sections

You may want SeeSearchWords to highlight only certain sections of your web pages, eg to highlight only in the main content pane. SeeSearchWords achieves this using the HiliteStart and HiliteEnd parameters, specifying text to look for in HTML comments. For example, if HiliteStart is set to SSW_START and HiliteEnd is set to SSW_END, then the following skin template HTML shows how to only highlight the "ContentPane" portion of the page:
<TR valign="top">
    <TD class="leftpane" id="LeftPane" runat="server" valign="top" align="center"></TD>
    
    <TD class="contentpane" id="ContentPane" runat="server" valign="top" align="center"></TD>
    
    <TD class="rightpane" id="RightPane" runat="server" valign="top" align="center"></TD>
</TR>
If these parameters are not set then SeeSearchWords highlights the entire page.
Conversely, if the parameters are set but not found, then SeeSearchWords never highlights.
The actual comment text must start with <!--, must match the letter case of the parameters exactly, and the parameter value must be surrounded by spaces.
More than one highlighting section may be specified - by repeating the start and end comments.

SeeSearchWords also does not highlight text as follows: from <div class="nossw"> until the next following </div>, eg:
This text is highlighted
<div class="nossw">This text is not highlighted</div>

Header

This is the default HTML used as the Header parameter:
<div style='background-color:yellow; font-size:x-small;'>
<a href='http://www.phdcc.com/seesearchwords/' target='_blank' title='SeeSearchWords %SSW_VERSION%'>SeeSearchWords</a>
has highlighted your %SEARCH_ENGINE% search: <b>%SEARCH%</b>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
<a href='%PLAIN_URL%'>Show page without highlighting</a>
</div>
The Header HTML can (optionally) contain variables that will be replaced at runtime by SeeSearchWords:

%PLAIN_URL% A URL to show the page without highlighting

%SEARCH% The user's search words

%SEARCH_ENGINE% The search engine used

%SSW_VERSION% The SeeSearchWords version

Because the header will usually contain a lot of HTML, it is usual to specify the header in a file (using @path as the Header parameter). To remove the header specify a blank Header:
<add key="Header" value="" />
SeeSearchWords can insert the header HTML at different points in the generated output, depending on which value is set in the options parameter.:

headertop: At the very start of the page

headerafterbody: After the page <BODY>

headerafterbodyform: After the first <FORM> tag after the page <BODY> tag

The first two options often result in an extra blank line after the header, so headerafterbodyform is the default.

%PLAIN_URL%	A URL to show the page without highlighting
%SEARCH%	The user's search words
%SEARCH_ENGINE%	The search engine used
%SSW_VERSION%	The SeeSearchWords version

Rules

SeeSearchWords uses 'rules' to generate variant words - so that if the user searched for learn then SeeSearchWords would highlight learn, learns and learning - if these words are on your page.

By default, SeeSearchWords uses an English set of rules. The following rule sets are available (res: indicates that the file is stored in the SeeSearchWords DLL):

Language Header parameter File

English res:SeeSearchWords.rulesen.txt rulesen.txt

French res:SeeSearchWords.rulesfr.txt rulesfr.txt

German res:SeeSearchWords.rulesde.txt rulesde.txt

To specify an alternate rules file, use @path as the rules parameter. The format of a rules file is specified here.

Note that the options parameter has HighlightPartialWords and HighlightPartialWordsAnywhere options which also act as highlighting rules. For example, with HighlightPartialWordsAnywhere set, a search for pla would highlight "plain" and "replant".

Language	Header parameter	File
English	`res:SeeSearchWords.rulesen.txt`	rulesen.txt
French	`res:SeeSearchWords.rulesfr.txt`	rulesfr.txt
German	`res:SeeSearchWords.rulesde.txt`	rulesde.txt

Patterns

At the start of every request to the application, SeeSearchWords looks to see if the request has search words that need to be highlighted. If highlighting is not needed, SeeSearchWords plays no further part in the request processing (unless the options parameter contains debuginfo).

SeeSearchWords determines if a request needs highlighting by looking for patterns, either in the request URL or the referrer URL. In most cases, SeeSearchWords will be looking for a pattern in the referrer URL. For example, if the user has just clicked to navigate from the Bing search results into your application, then the request URL will be on your site but the referrer URL will start with http://www.bing.com and will usually contain the user's search words in the q querystring parameter in the referrer URL. For example, a Bing search for SeeSearchWords highlights words will supply SeeSearchWords with a referrer URL of http://www.bing.com/search?q=SeeSearchWords+highlights+words. (SeeSearchWords is able to decode this correctly to convert the + characters to spaces, etc.)

This is the default text for the patterns parameter, finding search words to highlight for DNN, Bing, Yahoo, Ask and AOL. (Google is no longer supported.)
url,,Search,_nossw,DotNetNuke

ref,http://www.google.co,q,,Google
ref,http://www.google.co,as_epq,,Google
ref,http://www.google.co,as_q,,Google

ref,http://www.bing.com,q,,Bing
ref,http://search.msn.co,q,,MSN

ref,http://search.yahoo.com/search,p,,Yahoo
ref,http://search.yahoo.com/search,vp,,Yahoo

ref,*.ask.com/,q,,Ask
ref,*.aol.com/,q,,AOL

ref,,Search,,DotNetNuke

ref,^.*/SearchResults/.*/Search/(?<searchd>\S*)/,,,DotNetNuke
Each line is a pattern containing these comma-separated fields:

Type Which URL to match, either url for the the request URL or ref for the the referrer URL

match If query specified then

a string that starts the URL, or

if the string starts with * then the string must be anywhere in the URL;
otherwise a regular expression - see below.

query The QueryString parameter name that contains the search words

notquery If this QueryString parameter is present, then the words are not highlighted

engine The search engine name

For example, for this pattern:
ref,http://www.google.co,q,,Google
if the referrer URL starts with http://www.google.co and contains q QueryString parameter, then SeeSearchWords highlights the found words (from Google).

Regular expression matches

If the query pattern field is empty, then the match field specifies a regular expression. If the relevant URL matches the regular expression, then a match is found. The regular expression must set either a search or searchd group. If the found search words need to be UrlDecode-d, then set searchd; otherwise set search.

For example, an example DNN 3.0.13 Friendly URL search for look for might result in this as the referrer URL:
http://localhost/DNN3013/SearchResults/tabid/37/Search/look+for/Default.aspx
In plain English, SeeSearchWords needs to look for /SearchResults/ in the URL, with the search words after /Search/ up until the next / character. The following regular expression finds this (and reports the search words in the searchd group):
^.*/SearchResults/.*/Search/(?<searchd>\S*)/
This is built up as follows:

^ Match the start of the string

.* Match any character, repeated 0 or more times

/SearchResults/ Match literal /SearchResults/

.* Match any character, repeated 0 or more times

/Search/ Match literal /Search/

(?<searchd> Start capture group named searchd

\S* Match any non-space character, repeated 0 or more times

) End capture group

/ Match literal /

Open-SearchEngine

SeeSearchWords can be used in conjunction with the Open-SearchEngine from www.opendnn.com. You need to add two new patterns.

First, specify a Patterns parameter to refer to a file, eg:
<add key="Patterns" value="@DesktopModules/SSWpattern.Config" />
Create UTF-8 text file SSWpattern.Config, copying the default patterns above if you wish. Add in the following patterns:

url,SiteURL,xsq,_nossw,Open-SearchEngine ref,SiteURL,xsq,,Open-SearchEngine

Replace SiteURL with your site's base URL, eg http://www.example.org/.
Check that highlighting works as expected on all pages.

Type	Which URL to match, either `url` for the the request URL or `ref` for the the referrer URL
match	If query specified then a string that starts the URL, or if the string starts with * then the string must be anywhere in the URL; otherwise a regular expression - see below.
query	The QueryString parameter name that contains the search words
notquery	If this QueryString parameter is present, then the words are not highlighted
engine	The search engine name

^		Match the start of the string
.*		Match any character, repeated 0 or more times
	/SearchResults/	Match literal `/SearchResults/`
.*		Match any character, repeated 0 or more times
	/Search/	Match literal `/Search/`
(?<searchd>		Start capture group named `searchd`
\S*		Match any non-space character, repeated 0 or more times
)		End capture group
	/	Match literal `/`

Sites

In some situations, SeeSearchWords may be used on a server that hosts more than one web site, eg DNN with more than one portal.

The sites parameter specifies the site(s) that SeeSearchWords should respond at. If this parameter is missing then SeeSearchWords responds on all sites.

The sites parameter should either contain a single URL or an @FromFile URL text file that contains URLs one per line.

If a request URL starts with any one of the given sites URLs then highlighting is performed (assuming that a pattern matches). The match is done case insensitively.

Reviews

Sat, 5 Jan 2008 14:15:44 -0800
Mark L

Rating: 4 stars
Although this module does not install the same way as other modules, it gets the job done. The instructions could provide more examples of the different elements of the module, and be a little less vague. The instructions were not clear that there needs to be a separate config file for every parameter element. Also, you will need to clear your temporary internet files before going to Host>Site Settings>Restart Application. Support response time was prompt.

Fri, 27 Jan 2006 08:54:40 -0500
Nazer Aboobaker, Sudbury Regional Hospital, Canada

Thanks Chris for your quick response.
I would like to state which many others have stated many times. You have an excellent product and today I have experienced that support for the product is even outstanding.

Wed, 31 Aug 2005 10:05:36 -0400
William Winans, Rainbow Babies & Children's Hospital, Cleveland, USA

The module is fantastic, it makes the difference between an average and professional website. Our credibility to the web users grows by leaps and bounds when they see this type of functionality. I'll be launching our redesign in November, please feel free to use us as a satisfied customer.

Tue, 12 Jul 2005 09:20:00 +0200
Marc Poljak, Central Archive for Empirical Social Research, University Cologne, Germany

I cannot praise this little piece of software and his author enough. The ability to highlight hits and to navigate between the search words really refines your DNN search. SeeSearchWords has rapidly become indispensable for our intranet portal. And have I already mentioned the excellent support?

Alternatives and sites that do the same job

Cal Henderson's Google highlighter JavaScript - to add to each page's onload() function.
The Google toolbar has an option to highlight search words.
The sites www.dotnet247.com and www.webmasterworld.com highlight search words in a very similar way to SeeSearchWords.