Search

A search interface with faceted filtering. Contains a child listing block for results and typed facets (checkbox, select, date range, toggle) for filtering.

The search example block being edited in Inka

Search with Facets

Filter by

Content Type
Tags

Previewing and Testing Content

Preview content locally by serving the Markdown through the mock API, and check it with the block sanity test — which discovers every block on the served content and verifies it renders across frontends.

Content as Markdown

Author Plone block content as readable Markdown. One loader turns a .md file into block JSON, so the same file is the content the API serves, the deploy ships, and the docs render — with no JSON to hand-edit.

Visual Editing

Templates & Layouts

Templates allow editors to centrally control content and reuse content. They allow a developer to not have to hard code layout decisions and instead use rules to apply user layouts in template content stored separately from the page, or give the user a choice on which layout they want.

Server-rendered frontends

Inka works with any frontend, including ones that have no client-side

Live Preview

To make your site editable with Inka you load hydra.js in your frontend and call initBridge(). This sets up a two-way communication channel that handles authentication, page navigation, and live content updates.

Simple Search

Adding and moving blocks

The block chooser, slash menu, and drag handles are part of Inka and look the same everywhere. What you can pick from those choosers — the list of block types — comes from your site's design system. One site might offer "Lead paragraph", "Pull quote", "Stat highlight"; another might just have "Text" and "Image". Mechanic is identical.

Site Footer

Footer with social links and copyright

News Item View

Layout template for News Item content type pages

Event View

Layout template for Event content type pages

Block Reference Layout

Template for code examples at the bottom of block reference pages

Testing & the mock API

Author content as Markdown, serve it through the mock API, and check that every block renders — the local loop for content and blocks.

Developer Reference

Schema

Pass this object inside the blocks option when calling initBridge() to register this block type with the admin UI. See Custom Blocks for the full setup guide.

{
  "properties": {
    "variation": {
      "title": "Variation"
    },
    "query": {
      "title": "Query",
      "widget": "querystring"
    },
    "listingBodyTemplate": {
      "title": "Results template"
    },
    "showSearchInput": {
      "title": "Show search input",
      "type": "boolean"
    },
    "showSortOn": {
      "title": "Show sort on",
      "type": "boolean"
    },
    "showTotalResults": {
      "title": "Show total results",
      "type": "boolean"
    },
    "sortOnOptions": {
      "title": "Sort on options",
      "type": "array"
    },
    "facets": {
      "title": "Facets",
      "widget": "object_list",
      "typeField": "type",
      "allowedBlocks": [
        "checkboxFacet",
        "selectFacet",
        "daterangeFacet",
        "toggleFacet"
      ],
      "defaultBlockType": "checkboxFacet"
    },
    "headline": {
      "title": "Headline",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "title": {
      "title": "Title",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "facetsTitle": {
      "title": "Facets title",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "quickAnswerSample": {
      "title": "Sample question",
      "type": "string"
    },
    "quickAnswer": {
      "title": "Quick answer",
      "widget": "blocks_layout",
      "allowedBlocks": [
        "quickAnswer"
      ]
    },
    "listing": {
      "title": "Results Listing",
      "widget": "blocks_layout",
      "description": "Listing block to render search results",
      "allowedBlocks": [
        "listing",
        "default",
        "summary",
        "teaser",
        "image"
      ],
      "maxLength": 1,
      "defaultBlockType": "listing"
    }
  }
}

JSON Block Data

Example JSON as stored in the Plone content API. This is the data structure your component will receive in the block prop.

{
  "@type": "search",
  "headline": "Search with Facets",
  "listingBodyTemplate": "summary",
  "facetsTitle": "Filter by",
  "facets": [
    {
      "@id": "facet-type",
      "type": "checkboxFacet",
      "title": "Content Type",
      "field": {
        "value": "portal_type",
        "label": "Type"
      },
      "multiple": true,
      "hidden": false
    },
    {
      "@id": "facet-subject",
      "type": "checkboxFacet",
      "title": "Tags",
      "field": {
        "value": "Subject",
        "label": "Tags"
      },
      "multiple": true,
      "hidden": false
    }
  ],
  "blocks": {
    "facet-listing": {
      "@type": "listing",
      "variation": "summary",
      "querystring": {
        "query": [
          {
            "i": "path",
            "o": "plone.app.querystring.operation.string.absolutePath",
            "v": "/"
          }
        ],
        "sort_on": "effective",
        "sort_order": "descending"
      }
    }
  },
  "blocks_layout": {
    "listing": [
      "facet-listing"
    ]
  },
  "query": {
    "b_size": "4",
    "query": [
      {
        "i": "path",
        "o": "plone.app.querystring.operation.string.absolutePath",
        "v": "/"
      }
    ],
    "sort_on": "effective",
    "sort_order": "descending"
  },
  "showSearchInput": true,
  "showSortOn": true,
  "showTotalResults": true
}

Rendering

How this block renders in your frontend. Add its handling to your renderer, or — for list-style blocks — register a fetcher and reuse your list rendering.

function SearchBlock({ block, blockId }) {
  const [query, setQuery] = useState('');

  const facets = (block.facets || []).filter(f => !f.hidden);
  const listing = block.blocks_layout?.listing || [];
  const listingId = listing[0];
  const listingBlock = listingId ? (block.blocks?.[listingId]) : null;

  return (
    <div data-block-uid={blockId} className="search-block">
      {block.headline && <h2 data-edit-text="headline">{block.headline}</h2>}
      <input
        type="search"
        placeholder="Search..."
        value={query}
        onChange={e => setQuery(e.target.value)}
      />

      {facets.length > 0 && (
        <div className="facets">
          <h4 data-edit-text="facetsTitle">{block.facetsTitle || 'Filter'}</h4>
          {facets.map(facet => (
            <FacetRenderer key={facet['@id']} facet={facet} />
          ))}
        </div>
      )}

      {listingBlock && (
        <ListingBlock block={listingBlock} blockId={listingId} />
      )}
    </div>
  );
}

function FacetRenderer({ facet }) {
  switch (facet.type) {
    case 'checkboxFacet':
      return <fieldset data-block-uid={facet['@id']}><legend data-edit-text="title">{facet.title}</legend>{/* checkbox options */}</fieldset>;
    case 'selectFacet':
      return <label data-block-uid={facet['@id']}><span data-edit-text="title">{facet.title}</span><select>{/* options */}</select></label>;
    case 'daterangeFacet':
      return <label data-block-uid={facet['@id']}><span data-edit-text="title">{facet.title}</span><input type="date" /> – <input type="date" /></label>;
    case 'toggleFacet':
      return <label data-block-uid={facet['@id']}><input type="checkbox" /> <span data-edit-text="title">{facet.title}</span></label>;
    default:
      return null;
  }
}