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Case Insensitive Queries with the AEM Query Builder

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Recently, I needed to perform a query using the AEM Query Builder which was case insensitive. While I normally prefer using JCR SQL2 queries, in this case Query Builder was a better fit as I wanted consuming applications to be able to manipulate the query and doing so as a map is significantly easier than doing so as a string.

I was surprised to find that there was no native Query Builder Predicate for doing case insensitive queries so I ended up writing my own.

The predicate works by lower casing the value and then using the XPath fn:lower-case method to compare to the field value in lower case.

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package com.perficient.adobe.predicates;

import java.util.Locale;
import java.util.Optional;

import com.day.cq.search.Predicate;
import com.day.cq.search.eval.AbstractPredicateEvaluator;
import com.day.cq.search.eval.EvaluationContext;

import org.osgi.service.component.annotations.Component;
import org.slf4j.Logger;
import org.slf4j.LoggerFactory;

@Component(factory = "com.day.cq.search.eval.PredicateEvaluator/equalsIgnoreCase")
public class CaseInsensitiveEquals extends AbstractPredicateEvaluator {

    private static final Logger log = LoggerFactory.getLogger(CaseInsensitiveEquals.class);

    static final String PREDICATE_PROPERTY = "property";
    static final String PREDICATE_VALUE = "value";
    static final String PREDICATE_LOCALE = "locale";

    @Override
    public String getXPathExpression(Predicate predicate, EvaluationContext context) {
        log.debug("Evaluating predicate: {}", predicate);
        String property = predicate.get(PREDICATE_PROPERTY);
        Locale locale = Optional.ofNullable(predicate.get(PREDICATE_LOCALE)).map(lt -> Locale.forLanguageTag(lt))
                .orElse(Locale.getDefault());
        String value = predicate.get(PREDICATE_VALUE).toLowerCase(locale).replace("'", "''");
        String query = String.format("fn:lower-case(@%s)='%s'", property, value);
        log.debug("Generated query: {}", query);
        return query;
    }
} 

Once the custom predicate is available in your application, it can be used in any Query Builder query as such:

path=/content/test
equalsIgnoreCase.property=test
equalsIgnoreCase.value=test
equalsIgnoreCase.locale=en_US 

The locale parameter is not required, but would generally be recommended unless the input will always be in the system default locale.

Thoughts on “Case Insensitive Queries with the AEM Query Builder”

  1. Hey Dan, thanks for the post. I had two questions though.

    1. How and where am I supposed to add this code/service in my aem local running instance to deploy and test it out?
    2. Will this predicate work standalone as you showed or would it also work with groups like this:

    “`
    1_group.1_caseinsensitive.property=jcr:content/@jcr:title

    1_group.1_caseinsensitive.value=queryString %
    “`

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Dan Klco, Adobe Digital Marketing Technical Director

Dan is a certified Adobe Digital Marketing Technologist, Architect, and Advisor, having led multiple successful digital marketing programs on the Adobe Experience Cloud. He's passionate about solving complex problems and building innovative digital marketing solutions. Dan is a PMC Member of the Apache Sling project, frequent Adobe Beta participant and committer to ACS AEM Commons, allowing a unique insight into the cutting edge of the Adobe Experience Cloud platform.

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